Thomas Tibbals c.1615—1703

By Joseph Barnes, Esq.

 

A resident of Wethersfield, Connecticut’s first town and then part of Massachusetts Colony, Thomas Tibbals was one of Connecticut's first residents having sailed at age 20 to Massachusetts in 1635 aboard the "Truelove." He passaged as a "person of Quality" mainly meaning that he paid his fare and wasn't  a servant of any other passenger(s). According to Henry Whitmore of Brooklyn, New York in the 1800's, The name Tibbals derives from Theobald, one of the castles used by Queen Elizabeth 1st. It was shortened to Thebald then Tebald and in this country, the phonetic spelling Tebais or Tibbals. In English records it is sometimes spelled "Tibaiz" in phonetic spelling."  According to "English Church Times" of April 11, 1938, "Theobalds" is pronounced "Tibbals".

 

At the time he arrived in America, a powerful Indian tribe dominated Southern New England. Well organized and aggressive warriors, the Pequots under Sassacuss,  ruled from Narragansett Bay to the Hudson,  Block and Long Islands.  A number of Pequot killings of white settlers and traders starting in 1634, including Capt John Oldham a founder of Wethersfield while trading at Block Island, and a Capt Stone, who would occasionally drink and thus be unsuitable for Puritan civilization but nevertheless was English. Violence escalated in what could only be termed a war of annihilation against the settlers.

 

Early in 1637 Pequot raiders killed seven farmers, a woman and child and abducted two young women at Wethersfield.  Both Massachusetts and Plymouth Colonies mobilized and the Court at Hartford on May 1, 1637 authorized war against the Pequots. Capt. Mason with 90 men from Wethersfield, including Tibbals who served as an Indian expert and scout, and 70 Braves under “Mohegan” Chief Uncas, moved to Saybrook to fight. From there the party took their boats to the Thames where a powerful Pequot force was ensconced on the ridge at  Groton. Seeing a frontal assault uphill as not propitious, Mason sailed back out of he Thames and moved east.

 

Thinking they had won, Sassacus led a body of several hundred to destroy Wethersfield and Hartford. Far from giving up, Mason with Uncas and the Saybrook men under Capt. Underhill sailed to present day Rhode Island landing on Narraganset Bay. Joined by Narraganset Indians, they moved 38 miles through the wilderness to attack the Pequot fortified village "Misistuck" near Mystic. Attacking into the two entrances of the fort the men quickly got bogged down in close quarter combat and started suffered casualties. Mason withdrew and used the ultimate weapon of the age, he fired the village.

 

The result was more massacre than a battle; 600-700 men, women and children were killed. Only swift young braves escaped dodging the surrounding troops and their muskets. Many Pequots, abandoning the strong Harbor fort on the Thames, raced to the village to fight only to be cut down in open battle having given up their geographic advantage. Pequot survivors, joined by the Wethersfield raiding party recalled after the battle, fled west. Hot on their heels, Mason, bolstered by newly arrived Israel Stoughton’s 120 Massachussans and their Mohegan allies, pursued them on land and sea.

 

At the Connecticut River, Pequots found two or three white trappers, possibly Dutch, tied them to a tree and gutted them as a warning. The grisly sight did not deter the English who followed with all dispatch and, if anything, even more determination.

 

Soldiers chasing the fleeing Pequots passed through "Quinnipiak," called by the soldiers “Red Mount,” undoubtedly for East Rock. Peaceful Quinnipiac Indians, whose camp fires had brought the colonist's attention, were left unmolested.  Massachussans who tracked through the area deemed it the finest land in all of New England.

 

The final battle in the Southport area swamps decimated the remaining Pequots. Not wishing the repeat the carnage at the Mystic village, women, children and non-Pequots mostly Mattabesic whose village, Sasqua, was nearby, were allowed free exit but the Pequot braves fought on. Only a relative handful escaped in the fog the next morning but found few friends or safety. Mohawks, historic Pequot enemies and constant threat to the peaceful Iroquois (including the Wepawaugs), took the head of Sassacus and presented it as tribute to the English.

 

Sgt. Thomas Tibbals, returning from the swamp victory found a most appealing land with a brook with a good harbor. He returned  to Wethersfield, his job done, but remembered the pleasant coastal lands he had traversed. 

 

in 1637  two parties of Puritans escaping the religious oppression of Charles 1st's England sailed from London to Boston. All were welcomed and invited to stay in Massachusetts, but the two Reverends, Peter Prudden and  John Davenport, sought to establish their own colony and, with God's help, find their piece of heaven on earth. Hearing of the good reports of the "Red Mount" area to the South, a group led by Theophilus Eaton, Davenport's co-leader, scouted the south shores of New England looking for a suitable site. They found the headwaters of the Quinnipiac. The Prudden and Davenport parties sailed there the following spring, 1638, to found the  Colony of New Haven.

 

Peter Prudden was an inspiration to the puritan English settlers of New England. His stay in Boston netted him a number from Roxbury and Dorchester, MA, who joined the New Haven settlers including John Astwood, Thomas Baker, John Burwell, Benjamin Fenn,  Thomas Sanford, and Thomas Uffott.  He eventually preached in Connecticut's first town, Wethersfield, then still part of Massachusetts Colony. Richard Miles, Andrew Benton, John Fletcher, Thomas Tapping (Topping), George Hubbert, John Sherman (Sharman), Robert Treat and one Sgt. Thomas Tibbals also joined Prudden in New Haven. All would become Milford Founders.

 

In New haven, friction arose between the two reverends and their supporters. Sgt Tibbals with his experience in the Pequot War, suggested the Wepawaug area as a suitable place to remove the Prudden community. Sgt Tibbals and several men went to scout the area and indeed found it quite suitable.

 

A group of Prudden followers met with the Indian Sachem Ansantawae (2008 Hall of Fame Inductee) on February 12, 1639 to purchase the land encompassing nearly all of present day Milford, Orange and parts of Woodbridge.

 

Still in New Haven, the Prudden party met at Robert Newman's Barn on August 22, 1639 to found the First Church.  After approving the members who would move to the new colony, preparations were made. When the time came, Sgt Tibbals, who had then been to the Wepawaug area several times, led the bulk of the party through the woods on winding Indian trails with their animals, food and personal possessions. Bulky items, farm and personal utensils and the pre-fabricated frame work for the common house was transported by sea. Nearly a third of Milford's founders were Colonists from the Boston area and Wethersfield, including Tibbals, who, inspired by Prudden, joined his Hertfordshire Immigrants at New Haven then Milford.

 

In commemoration of his knowledge of the area in suggesting the Wepawaug as the home of the new colony and guiding the Society to this promised land, Sgt Thomas Tibbals was granted founder's lot #53 (and, possibly, two other parcels) and the status of one of the 44 original free planters. He had two wives Mary, d. 6/18/1644, and Sarah (?) and sired seven children, Mary, Samuel, John, Thomas, Josiah, Sarah and Hannah. It was said he also had an Indian sweetheart who lived in the Milford area and that he married her, but we have no proof of this. At least one report indicates he was a Free Mason by 1669 so he may have been a "free thinker" by Puritan standards.

 

After 1665 he would be called "Captain Tibbals" indicating either esteem of the community, or a high position of  Milford's civic defense, probably both. Indian raiding, particularly Mohawk, was a constant threat well into the 18th Century. Milford, in addition to the surrounding stockade, had a well trained and active militia, military training and constant watches assigned to its citizens on a rotating basis.

 

After he died at age 88 on April 8, 1703, his dear friends, Governor Robert Treat (HOF inductee) and Daniel Buckingham,  served to oversee his will.

 

For his service his name appears prominently on the Memorial Bridge. Many generations of his descendants still reside in the area. Tibbal's store, belonging to a descendant,  was a fixture of downtown Milford through much of he 19th to early 20th centuries.