Joshua CHANDLER

Male 1728 - 1787  (59 years)


Personal Information    |    Sources    |    All    |    PDF

  • Name Joshua CHANDLER  [1
    Birth 01 Mar 1727/8  Woodstock, Massachusetts Find all individuals with events at this location  [1
    Gender Male 
    Death 09 Mar 1787  [1
    Notes 
    • "The Chandler Family" - Col. Joshua Chandler Jr., Esq and Sarah Miles, New Haven, Conn., dau. of Joseph, son of John, son of Richard Miles. Sarah Miles, b. 6 Oct. 1722; d. ?
      She lived only about two weeks after the family arrived in the Provinces. She was a delicate person, and suffered much on the passage there.
      He was graduated at Y.C. 1747, being ranked the thirteenth in the class of twenty-nine, in "dignity of family." He settled at New Have in the practice of the law, and his house stood where the Tontine Hotel was afterwards built. The Chandler house, moved off, was afterwards the residence of Rev. Dr. L. Bacon. The original site of the house was the north part of the "Matthew Gilbert Lot." It came to Mr. Chandler from timothy Alling. He and his son-in-law, Amos Botsford, who lived on the rear of it, owned the whole of that square. he owned the Avery estate at New Haven, and also a salt marsh farm, five or six miles out from New Haven, near which passes the railroad. He got about a hundred Frenchmen from the Provinces to dyke it. This is still called the "Chandler Farm."
      At a town meeting at New Haven, 23 May 1774, Joshua Chandler Esq., was placed first on a Committee of eighteen, "of Correspondence for the Public Safety." He was a member of the Legislature of Conn. 1775. But he was soon suspected of loyalty, and was sent to North Haven as a prisoner b the Whigs of New Haven. Like many of his relatives in the country who held offices in the colonies under the King, he was loyal to the mother country; and when New Haven was invaded by the British troops under Major-Gen. Wm. Tryon on Monday, at noon, 5th July, 1779, while the Whigs were celebrating their independence from the mother country, they were piloted in by two of the sons of Mr. Chandler. Now the crisis had come, he could no longer remain neutral. But the next morning, while he was preparing an entertainment for his "friends", Gen. Tryon told him that he could not hold the place, for the militia were fast gathering. The outposts were called in, and the enemy retreated, taking some of the prominent citizens prisoners, and others of them as friends. Mr. Chandler and his family went off as friends and so sudden was the departure that Gov. Baldwin, who was then a boy, said afterward he remembered going into Mr. Chandler's house on the morning after they left, and there seeing the table spread for a large company, and the viands all untouched. His son John, if he left at all, soon returned to New Haven.
      While on Long Island, 10 Feb. 1782, he, with others addressed "Mr. Rivington, acting Deptuy Inspector General of Refugees on the Island" and stated that "we were driven from our respective homes, having left our property in the country," etc.
      His property in and near New Haven, Conn., which he valued at L30,000 was confiscated under the agency of Charles Chauncy, Esq., of New Haven.
      Joshua Candler settled at Annapolis, Nova Scotia, on the South Shore of the Bay of Fundy. "The landing of the Loyalities, May 18, 1783, "is one of the remarkable events noticed in teir registers ad that day as it returns is still celebrated by a salute of cannon firing, at noon.
      Charles Chauncy exhibited the inventory of his estate 1 Apr. 1781, L8,755; 8s.:1 1/2 d. It was solf for L8,050:1s.;2d.
      Col. Chandler had a large property at New Haven, which he was forced to leave. He sailed for England to see about a remuneration for his loss. commissions were appointed to adjust the claims of the loyalists. He returned to Annapolis' and, on that fatal March of 1787, he, with his daughter Elizabeth, and son William Chandler took all their books, papers and evidence of their colonial property, and sailed across the Bay for St. John, New Brunswick, to meet the Commissioners, to prove their titles and their losses, and to get their claims allowed. but the vessel in a violent snow storm missing the harbor, was driven on the rocks on Musquash Point, within about nine miles of St. John. His son william, hoping to secure the vessel, fastened a rope around his body and jumped overboard to swim to the land, but he was immediately crushed between the vessel and the rocks, and was drowned. This was on the 9th of March, 1787. Col.Chandler, his daughter Elizabeth, and others, finally got ashore. But they were miles from any dwelling and the weather severe. It is said he urged his daughter to leave him and make her way to some house, but that she refused to leave her father. He then climbed a high point of the rocks for a look-out, from which, being so benumbed with cold, he fell and soon died. The others, his daughter and Mrs. Grant, after wandering about in the woods perished on the 11th March, 1787. Their bodies were found and carried to St. John, N.B. and buried in the old burying ground at the head of King Street.
      After about seventy years their remains were sought for, but only the smallest portion of the larger bones were found. These were "carefully depsited in the lot of Amos Botsford, Esq., in the "Rural Cemetery," the new and beautiful Woodside grounds at St. John. the old slate-stone slabs - about two by three feet - were laid aganst the embankment fo the Botsford lot; the letters of the inscription having been cut deeper by the pious order of his descendants. Under the "death's head," with rays and wings, is the following inscription:
      Here lyeth the Bodies of Col.
      Joshua Chandler, Aged 61 years
      And William Chandler, His
      Son Aged 29 years, who were
      Ship wreck'd on their passage
      from Dighy to St. John on the
      Night of the 9th day of March
      1787 & perished in the Woods
      on the 11th of said Month.
      Here lyeth the Bodies of Mrs.
      Sarah Granat Aged 38
      Years Widow
      of the late Major Alex
      Grant;
      & Miss Elizabeth
      Chadler aged
      27 years, who were
      shipwreck'd on
      their passage from Digby
      to St.
      John on the Night of
      th 9th day
      March 1787 and
      Perished in the
      Woods on the 11th of said Month.

      His son Charles Henry Chandler, soon after the death of his father, then about twenty years old, went to Europe to get the claims of the estgate allowed. e took what evidence of the losses of the amily he could find. He took what evidence of the losses of the family he could find. But they had mostly been lost in the wreck. Charles H. Chandler remained in England a year, trying to get a hearig and to get the claims allowed. The Commissioners at last said to him, "We know your father oshua Chandler was wealthy and had large and just claims, but we do not know how much, and there is no proof of it. We will allow you each, Mrs. Sarah Botsford, Mrs. Mary Upham, Thomas, Samuel and Charles H Chandler, L1,000.".......
    Person ID I10719  Main Tree
    Last Modified 18 May 2021 

    Father Joshua CHANDLER,   b. 09 Feb 1695/6, New London, Connecticut Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 15 Apr 1768 (Age 72 years) 
    Relationship Birth 
    Mother Elizabeth CUTLER,   b. 20 Apr 1705, Reading, Connecticut Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Relationship Birth 
    Family ID F22981  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Sarah MILES,   b. 06 Oct 1722 
    Marriage 21 Sep 1747  [1
    Children 
     1. John CHANDLER,   b. 01 Feb 1754   d. Bef 16 Jan 1805 (Age < 50 years)  [Natural]
    Family ID F22980  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  • Sources 
    1. [S00085] George Chandler, of Worcester, Mass., "The Descendants of William and Annis Chandler" who settled in Roxbury, Mass. 1637, (Name: Name: Worcester, Mass,: Press of Charles Hamilton;;).