Stephen Bradley's Bridge

There was an interesting occurrence this past month concerning The History of the Village and Town of East Haven Connecticut from the First Grant of Land in 1644 to 1873 by Reverend Daniel Havens. An inquiry was made as to information on the bridge down by the Old Mill on Lake Saltonstall. Haven's section on bridges gave a good introduction in the History:



"Another bridge was built over Stoney River near the Iron Works, now known as Stephen Bradley's Bridge."



In the table of contents for the chapter on bridges entry number 48 is listed as " Rebuilding of Stephen Bradley's Bridge over Stoney River ordered by town." However, the chapter ends at number 36. The following entries are not there. I had been using the typewritten copy of the History, so I turned to the notebooks that were transcribed from Haven's original handwriting. The notebook also ended at number 36. I then called James Campbell at the New Haven Colony Historical Society, which holds the original document. He was kind enough to send over both a fax and to also mail a photocopy. But Haven's handwriting is extremely difficult to decipher (as shown below) so, for the moment, the text remains a mystery.