Page 8 - Wallingford Magazine Issue 55 Summer 2025

1741. In anticipation of this event, Captain Lawrence Clin- face discrimination and persecution once again as Loyalists
ton (Elizur’s ancestor) and others erected the Union Church in the Revolutionary War.
on Old Mix Lane off Clintonville Road, a small rustic struc-
ture on the property that would later become part of Elizur Considered a foreign mission by the Church of England in
Clinton’s farm. According to the History of Wallingford and the 18th Century, the small building that had played a big
Meriden by Davis, it was “about 12 feet square, low, and role in the establishment of the Episcopal Church in our
with a comparatively steep roof.” Captain David Cook, an- town fell into disrepair sometime after 1953.
other wealthy ship owner from Wallingford, paid a third of
the cost of the building. Rev. Morris served this and sever- Conclusion
al other area churches and was paid the major part of his Initially as I began to peruse Elizur’s diary, I hoped to un-
salary from the church in England. At his retirement, there cover something really “interesting” among the daily hum-
were 25 families on the church rolls. Morris was succeed- drum of life: a body in the rye field; a missing person; a
ed by several other clergymen. Music was always of great runaway spouse, a natural disaster. Though nothing sen-
importance to Wallingford’s Church of England/Episcopa- sational materialized in my research, I came to appreciate
lians, wrote Rev. J.E. Wildman who served the church at the little details of life from the viewpoint of a Wallingford
the turn of the last century. Even from the beginning in the farmer in 1877. Though much is missing to paint a full
little Union Church, with only their voices as instruments, picture of Elizur’s life, taken together, the daily notations
the parishioners joined in song; and as resources allowed create an understanding of how things were in the Clin-
going forward, added an organ (a gift from Captain David tonville section of Wallingford at that time. Of course, if I
Cook), other instruments, and a choir. had unearthed Elizur Clinton’s diary for the following year,
1878, I would have seen that on Friday, August 9, the worst
Rev. Ichabod Camp, the first Union Church minister born in tornado ever came through town, leaving destruction in
America, took over in 1752 after receiving his holy orders its wake.
in England. By about 1757 the little church was bulging at
the seams, and it was decided to create a new building Clinton’s brief obituary in the Morning Journal-Courier on
close to the town center at the Northwest corner of North Sep 16, 1902 read, “Elizur Clinton, one of Clintonville’s pro-
Main and Christian Streets where Moses Y. Beach School gressive farmers was born and always lived in the house
sits today. The new church was dedicated in a special cere- where he died. He was a good neighbor, a kind husband
mony in 1762. Three years later, it was christened St. Paul’s and father. He leaves two sons and three daughters to
Episcopal Church and eventually moved to it’s current lo- mourn his loss.”
cation, a few blocks south on North Main Street. A decade
later Wallingford’s Church of England congregants would

8 WALLINGFORD MAGAZINE - SUMMER 2025