Roger Sherman Fact Sheet

(1721 – 1793)

Early Life (1721 – 1742):

• Born April 19, 1721, in Newton, MA, third of seven children.
• Parents: William and Mehetabel Sherman; father a cobbler (shoemaker) and farmer.
• Common school education; borrowed pastor’s books for home study.
• Apprenticed as cobbler.
• Father died when Roger was 20 years old (1741).
• Struggled to support mother and family on home farm.

Important Decisions in 1743; New Dilloway:

• Needed to earn more money to educate brothers and sisters.
• Foresaw need for surveyors; planned to join older brother William in New Milford, CT, and learn surveying while continuing as a cobbler. Place of unlimited opportunity. Self-taught in mathematics.
• On April 5, 1743, bought 250 acres, a house, 2 barns from one Adoniram Treadwell for £1300. The land was “Bounded Southerly by the Wimisink Brook & easterly By the Said ousatunnack (Housatonic) River Northerly By Sd. River & the Wilderness & Westerly with the Wilderness.” The whole 250 acres were called New Dilloway, present-day Sherman. Lived there with his mother and teenage siblings.

Work as a Surveyor:

• Moved to New Milford around 1745 after New Fairfield had sent him a tax bill for his New Dilloway property in 1744.
• Appointed “Surveyor of Lands” for County of New Haven in 1745 by the General Assembly. (New Milford was then part of New Haven Country).
• Purchased house and lot (87 acres) on Park Lane in 1748 to be close to town (political) center.
• Married Elizabeth Hartwell of Stoughton, MA, in 1749. They had 7 children.
• Surveyed the length of New Fairfield (14 miles) in 1752.
• Became surveyor for Litchfield County in 1752 when it was split off from New Haven County. This was a very lucrative position; New Milford then required that true accounts of property lines be given by oath. Re-surveyed land in New Milford, which up to then had just been estimated.
• Employed by CT Colony to survey ungranted lands.
• Worked as surveyor for 13 years. Engaged in real-estate trading.

A New Milford Merchant. Publisher of Almanacs and Lawyer:

• With William as partner opened mercantile in 1750 near present site of Town Hall in New Milford (plaque in front of New Milford Town Hall designating site of Roger Sherman’s store).
• Carried all lines; barter trading; exchanged farm products.
• Set up branches in Wallingford and New Haven.
• Visited New Haven to buy West India molasses; Stopped at Yale College to discuss astronomy.
• Published Almanac from 1750 until 1761.
• Studied law; admitted to the Litchfield County courts,1754. Appointed Justice of Peace, 1755.

Life in New Milford (1745 – 1760):

• Led effort to rebuild the “Great Bridge” over the Housatonic River, which was carried away by the flood of 1755, and turned it into a toll bridge.
• Interested people in the experiment of vaccination for Small Pox.
• Was active in building the Meeting House and held many church offices.
• Became Representative in the CT Assembly for New Milford (1755).
• By 1758 one of the wealthiest men in town and possibly largest landowner in Litchfield County.
• His wife, Elizabeth, died in 1760, leaving him with 7 young children.

Life in New Haven (1761 – 1793):

• Moved to New Haven in 1761, a larger town with more opportunities.
• Became a merchant in New Haven from 1761 – 1772 and dealt in books, provisions, and general merchandise. Stopped practicing law and surveying.
• Married Rebecca Prescott in 1763 with whom he had 8 children.
• Appointed Treasurer of Yale College and received honorary degree in 1765. Ralph Earl painting.
• Public offices held: Representative in CT General Assembly (1764), Justice of Peace, Judge of Superior Court
• Revised and codified laws of CT in 1783.
• Elected mayor of New Haven in 1784 until his death in 1793.
• Served as CT member of the House in the First U.S. Congress (1789-91)
• US Senator for CT (1791-93). Supported Hamilton’s idea of a national bank.
• Died on July 23, 1793, in New Haven at the age of 72 from typhoid fever.

Contributions to the Nation:

• Delegate to First Continental Congress (1774), Second Continental Congress (1775-76) and Constitutional Convention (1787).
• Member of Committee of Five to draft Declaration of Independence. John Trumbull painting.
• The only person to sign all four founding documents of government:

1.     Articles of Association, 1774 (a forerunner of union under the Articles of Confederation)

2.     Declaration of Independence, 1776. Depicted in John Trumbull painting.

3.     Articles of Confederation, 1781

4.     The Federal Constitution, 1787

• Co-authored (with Oliver Ellsworth) the Great Compromise, also known as the Connecticut Compromise, that saved the Constitutional Convention of 1787: proportional representation in the House and equal representation in the Senate.

In Memoriam:

• Devoted to the cause of good education for family and others.
• Buried in Grove Street Cemetery, New Haven.
• Statue of Roger Sherman in Memorial Hall, U.S. Capital, Washington, D.C.
• The town of Sherman, CT, was named after Roger Sherman in 1802.
• Held public office for around 50 years, a record even in today’s standards.
• Was a puritan all his life; strong moral and ethical beliefs; “Never said a foolish thing in his life.”

The Sherman Historical Society, Sherman CT 860-354-3083
shermanhistorical@sbcglobal.net

The Society is grateful to SNET of Connecticut for a grant to design this web site and to bring the Sherman Historical Society on-line.

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