History of Brookfield, Massachusetts, USA

The cannons were captured from the British at Fort Ticonderoga and Crown Point. They were transported from Lake Champlain to Dorchester Heights, Massachusetts and used by George Washington's army on March 17, 1776 (Evacuation Day) to free Boston from British control during the American Revolutionary War.

General Henry Knox Trail - Historic Marker reads:
"Through this place passed General Henry Knox in the winter of 1775-1776 to deliver to General George Washington at Cambridge the train of artillery from Fort Ticonderoga used to force the British army to evacuate Boston."

In March 1778, Joshua Spooner, a wealthy farmer in Brookfield, was beaten to death and his body stuffed down a well. Four people were hanged for the crime: two British soldiers, a young Continental soldier, and Spooner's wife, Bathsheba, who was charged with instigating the murder. She was 32 years old and five months pregnant when executed. Newspapers described the case as "the most extraordinary crime ever perpetrated in New England."

Bathsheba was the mother of three young children, and in her own words felt "an utter aversion" for her husband, who was known to be an abusive drunk.

A year before the murder, she took in and nursed a sixteen-year-old Continental soldier who was returning from a year's enlistment under George Washington. The two became lovers and conceived a child.

Divorces were all but impossible for women at that time, and adulteresses were stripped to the waist and publicly whipped. Bathsheba's pregnancy occasioned a series of desperate plots to murder her ...

Brookfield, Massachusetts
Worcester county. The Indian Quaboag, a large, fertile and beautiful township, in two parishes, well watered by several large ponds which give rise to a principal branch of Chickopee river. For about forty years after its first settlement, in 1660, this town suffered exceedingly by the Indians. The ponds afford fine fish of various kinds, and in this town is a mineral spring of some celebrity. It lies 59 miles W. from Boston, 18 W. from Worcester, and 7 E. from Ware. Incorporated, 1673. Population, 1830, 2,342; 1837, 2,514. The agricultural products of this town are butter, cheese, wool, and fine beef cattle. The manufactures consist of boots, shoes, leather, iron castings, ploughs, chairs, cabinet ware, palm-leaf hats, silver plate, shoe makers rolling and shingle machines, sleighs, carpenters' hammers, coach wrenches, sewing silk, and wooden legs. These manufactures, for the year ending April 1, 1837, amounted to $248,502, exclusive of the silk.

Brookfield was originally granted to persons from Ipswich, in Essex county, and it was long a connecting link between the eastern towns and those on the Connecticut.

North Brookfield, Warren and part of New Braintree, were taken from Brookfield.

Brookfield is situated on the Quaboag, which is connected with
three considerable ponds, and the town, for a time, was named after the river.

Brookfield suffered greatly in Phillip's War, and every house was
burned. On their return, after the death of Philip, the inhabitants continued to be annoyed by the French and Indians as late as the year 1710.

The soil is excellent. The chief manufactures are boots, shoes,
and iron ware.

Distance from Worcester, 18 miles ; from Boston, 68

This town was granted to a number of the inhabitants of Ispwich, in the county of Essex, by the general court, (upon their petition,) in May, 1660. The tract granted was to be six miles square. The grantees, that they might have a just right to the soil, purchased and took a deed of the natives. This place progressed so rapidly that, upon application to the general court, it was incorporated a town in 1673.

The church was gathered, and the first minister, Rev. Thomas Cheney, was ordained here in 1717; he died in 1747, and was succeeded by Rev. Elisha Harding who was ordained in 1749. The town increased so rapidly that in 1750 a second parish was incorporated in the northerly part of the town, now North Brookfield. Mr. Harding continued the minister of the first precinct till his people fell into a controversy about a new meeting-house. The contention was so severe that the society parted, and the third parish was formed in 1754. The church was gathered in 1756, and in 1758 Rev....

Brookfield, a post-township of Worcester county, Massachusetts, 55 miles W. by S. from Boston. Population, 1674.