East Hartford

41.7822° N, 72.6125° W

East Hartford: Its History and Traditions

As its name suggests, East Hartford is located east of the town of Hartford, Connecticut. What were known as the River Tribes, including the Podunks, lived in what would become East Hartford. Thomas Burnham purchased “a large tract of land of Tantinomo, the ‘one-eyed’ Sachem of the Podunks” that covered East Hartford (Goodwin 58). The residents of East Hartford petitioned the Connecticut General Assembly to grant East Hartford the privileges of a distinct town on five separate occasions (1726, 1728, 1737, 1769, and 1774), but East Hartford did not officially become a town separate from Hartford until 1783. An aspiring minister for the Connecticut Indians, David Crosby, wrote Eleazar Wheelock several correspondences from East Hartford.