The Crown Point Road

The Crown Point Road. . , The British, upon command of General Jeffrey Amherst, began construction of the Crown Point Road in 1759 during the French and Indian War to provide a more direct route for the provision of fresh troops and supplies between their fort at Crown Point, New York and their Fort # 4 on the Connecticut River in New Hampshire. The road provided a shorter route than the previously established supply route from the Atlantic ports by way of Albany and Lake George. Captain John Stark and Lieutenant John Small are credited with carrying out the order to construct the road. In 1760 they improved what they had built the year before, especially in the east, where the road was only a trail and needed to be 20 feet wide for wagons., In the summer heat of 1760, there were many desertions from the 360 troops building the road, and one soldier received 100 lashes for encouraging mutiny, but by the end of summer five droves of cattle of about 80 head each had made the trip, plus men, arms, and provisions., During the American Revolution, colonial militias, schooled by the British during the previous war, turned the tables on them and utilized the road to their own advantage, contributing to the ultimate British defeat., In addition to its military purpose, the road also served to open the wilderness to settlers. Almost seven of the approximately 85 miles of the CPR are in Weathersfield, where the first settler arrived in 1768. By 1800 the town had 1,944 residents, who had been using the road as their main artery from which other roads branched out., The route in Weathersfield includes the only two remaining original milestones on the Crown Point Road. There are also many sites in Weathersfield attesting to the use of the CPR in this town in the late 1700s. There are two cemeteries, three cellar holes, the remains of a pre-Revolutionary sawmill, and a fine home built in 1780 along the route of the Crown Point Road in Weathersfield., The Town of Weathersfield accepted the CPR as a Town road in 1782 and again the next year with an alteration. In 2010 the Weathersfield Select Board retained the road as a Class 4 Town road following the route "along what is historically known and marked as the Crown Point Road." , CPR Association, [Illustration captions, left to right, read] , . General Jeffrey Amherst , Road Builder (1717-1797), . Captain John Stark , Road Builder (1728-1820), . Lieutenant John Small , Road Builder (1726-1796), . The Crown Point Road in Weathersfield, . The Crown Point Road through Springfield and Weathersfield, . Original 10-mile marker stone, 1759, near Branch Creek, . [Map of Vermont showing fort locations]