In 1649 the Mohegan sachem, Uncas, granted Jonathan Brewster 450 acres of choice land on the Thames River across from Fort Shantok. In exchange, Jonathan was to establish an Indian trading post which he and his heirs should operate from that time forward. It was a wonderful opportunity for a man who’d experienced hardship and personal tragedy.

Jonathan had emigrated from England to Holland in 1608. His father, William, had been an official in Queen Elizabeth’s administration, but his religious beliefs had put him at odds with her successor, King James, forcing the Brewsters to seek sanctuary with the more tolerant Dutch. Later when his parents and brothers, Love and Wrestling, left for America on the Mayflower, Jonathan stayed behind. He joined them in 1621 with the second wave of Pilgrims aboard the Fortune. Jonathan had recently lost his wife and newborn baby and needed a fresh start, but things didn’t begin well.

When the Fortune anchored off Cape Cod, the Pilgrims, who weren’t expecting a second ship, mistook her for an enemy French vessel, readied their cannon, and prepared for hostilities. When they realized this was a friendly English ship, everyone was relieved but then horrified to realize she hadn’t brought any provisions, just 37 extra mouths to feed for a community already close to starvation. As William Bradford recorded in “Of Plimouth Plantation,” “Ther was not so much as bisket-cake or any other victialls for them, neither had they any beding, but some sory things they had in their cabins, nor pot, nor pan … nor overmany cloaths (sic).”

The community immediately went on half rations, and the new arrivals were parceled out among the seven houses and four public buildings that comprised the entire settlement. It was November, the start of the settlers’ second New England winter, but one hopeful factor was that the newcomers were mostly healthy young men capable of hard labor.

In the struggle to survive, Jonathan’s activities exemplify the importance of being versatile. He’d been a lintwercker (ribbon maker) in Holland, but in Massachusetts he established a ferry service, laid out highways, surveyed land, practiced law, served in Myles Standish’s militia, helped settle the town of Duxbury, and traded along the coast from Plymouth to Virginia. Jonathan sometimes sailed up the Thames River to trade with the Indians and established a bond of friendship with them.

If this sounds overly diversified, it was; Jonathan experienced financial reverses that forced him to sell “his dwelling house, out house, Barnes, Stables, orchyrds, gardens, Land, Meddow & pastures” (sic) to clear his debts.

In 1649, following this disaster, he moved to New London, became the town recorder, and settled first on the corner of today’s Granite and Hempstead streets, and then at his trading post on Brewster’s Neck.

Jonathan and his second wife, Lucretia, stayed there several years, enjoying their trading monopoly with the Mohegans. In 1657 during a conflict between the Narragansetts and the Mohegans, Jonathan was one of the colonists defending Uncas. Two years later, perhaps in retaliation, a Narragansett raiding party attacked the trading post, terrifying Lucretia (Jonathan was away in Hartford), and killing an Indian servant who was protecting her.

Lucretia survived and lived another 19 years. Jonathan died soon after the attack and lies with Lucretia and many of their descendants in Brewster’s Neck Cemetery.

During the 20th century, Brewster’s Neck became the site of the Norwich State Hospital, but after its closing the complex fell into disrepair, leaving the site a financial liability. Today, in a neat turn of history’s wheel, Preston has approved the Mohegans’ memorandum of understanding for pursuing steps to reacquire the property and develop it to benefit both “partners across the river” and the entire state.

When this was announced in May, Tribal Chairman Kevin Brown commented on how much this means to the Mohegans. He said, “It all matters to us, forever.”

Carol Sommer of Waterford is a self-proclaimed history nut. She writes a monthly history column inspired by local street signs.