Queen Anne's War and the Scott Family

The story of the Scott family during the early 1700s has been told many times over the centuries as a tale of abduction, torture, death, and “savages,” a tale of life on the frontier for “heroic, rugged and long-suffering pioneers” who settled Waterbury and Watertown. Thanks to the magic of the internet and archivists who have worked to digitize historical documents, a more thorough and balanced account of story can now be told.

Essential to the story is Queen Anne’s War and colonial Connecticut’s interactions with neighboring colonies and with New France. This historical period doesn’t get as much attention as it should, so I have included a fair amount of detail to help explain the context of the Scott family story.

Depiction of a colonial farm being cleared
This engraving appears on numerous commercial websites, but none of them give the original source.

Traditional Telling of the Story

A very short summary of the Scott family story is this: sometime around 1709, Joseph Scott was abducted, tortured, and murdered by Indians. His body was found by his neighbors on a hillside not far from the Naugatuck River, somewhere near what we now call the Leatherman’s Cave. Scott was buried where he was found, the grave covered in rocks. A year or two later, Joseph’s brother Jonathan Scott was picnicking under a tree with two of his sons when they were captured by Indians. Jonathan’s right thumb was cut off to prevent him from resisting. The three Scotts were taken to Canada. Eventually, Jonathan Scott and one of his sons returned to Waterbury; the other son remained in Canada with the Indians, despite Jonathan’s efforts to free him. Jonathan Scott’s wife, Hannah Hawks Scott, had previously lost most of her family during the 1704 Indian raid on Deerfield, Massachusetts, leading one historian to dub her “the most afflicted woman in New England.” (Anderson, ed., The Town and City of Waterbury, Vol. 1: 257)

The Weston House

Tucked away in the middle of a large block on West Side Hill is a house built in the middle of the 19th century for Catharine Weston and her family. The early history of the house's ownership is one of female empowerment and of Black entrepreneurship.

1048 West Main Street (1050 West Main can be seen behind to the left)

Architectural Style

The house was built using wood frame construction in a simplified version of the Greek Revival style. It is a common house style that can be seen throughout western Connecticut. The house is relatively small and modest, designed as a cozy private home rather than a showy display of wealth. The siding would originally have been wood clapboards (it now has asphalt siding).