Stonington

Stonington may refer to:

Places

See also

Stonington, Connecticut

The town of Stonington is located in New London County, Connecticut, United States, in the state's southeastern corner. It includes the borough of Stonington, the villages of Pawcatuck, Lords Point, and Wequetequock, and the eastern halves of the villages of Mystic and Old Mystic (the other halves being in the town of Groton). The population of the town was 18,545 at the 2010 census.

History

The first European colonists established a trading house in the Pawcatuck section of town in 1649. The present territory of Stonington was part of lands that had belonged to the Pequot people, who referred to the areas making up Stonington as Pawcatuck (Stony Brook to the Pawcatuck River) and Mistack (Mystic River to Stony Brook). It was named "Souther Towne" or Southerton by Massachusetts in 1658, and officially became part of Connecticut in 1662 when Connecticut received its royal charter. Southerton was renamed "Mistick" in 1665 and again renamed Stonington in 1666.Thomas Miner, Walter Palmer, William Chesebrough and Thomas Stanton were the founders. The town of North Stonington was set off as a parish from Stonington in 1724 and incorporated as a town in 1807.

Stonington (borough), Connecticut

Stonington is a borough and the town center of the town of Stonington in New London County, Connecticut, United States, and known as "The Borough" to locals. The population was 929 at the 2010 census.

The densely built Borough of Stonington occupies a point of land that projects into Little Narragansett Bay. It has two main streets that link two squares: Cannon Square and Wadawanuck Square, named for the former Wadawanuck Hotel that brought wealthy visitors in the post-Civil War era. The lack of through traffic or modern industry, together with the borough's role as a fashionable summer residence, have preserved its colonial, Federal, and outstanding Greek revival domestic architecture, while the activity of one of Connecticut's last remaining fishing and lobstering fleets keep it from being simply a quaint, historic village. There is a large community of Portuguese descent.

History

On August 30, 1775, during the American Revolutionary War, a tender chased two small private sloops into Stonington Harbor. When it was discovered that the sloops had made it to the dock and discharged their passengers, the tender fired a broadside into the dockside towns and stores before sailing out of the harbor again. It returned later in the company of another tender and the HMS Rose. All three ships then bombarded the town throughout the day. The local militia assembled and returned fire, claiming to have killed five or six men aboard the ships.