Welcome,
to the Cabot Historical Society
incorporated 1978
to the Cabot Historical Society
incorporated 1978
"History does not belong to us; we belong to it."
-- Hans-Georg Gadamer
-- Hans-Georg Gadamer
Visit the Apple Pie page so you can see how to enjoy our
fall festival.
How should we start telling you about Cabot? Well, why
not start at the beginning with the history of our name.
fall festival.
How should we start telling you about Cabot? Well, why
not start at the beginning with the history of our name.
A Love Story
How Cabot got its name.
It has been said that a man could live in Cabot for Seventy-Five years and have been a resident of four
counties without ever leaving his place of birth. The town has been successively part of the Vermont
counties of Cumberland, Orange, Caledonia and, since 1855, Washington. As far as can be discovered,
Cabot is the only town in Vermont to have been named as a result of a romantic attachment. Major
Lyman Hitchcock of Connecticut and Miss Sophia Cabot fell in love while Lyman was still in the
Continental Army. Sophia's father refused to let his daughter marry a soldier, and the lovers were
thwarted. Then Lyman got in on a Vermont grant in which he was the next-to-largest land buyer.
Sophia's father went north with a survey crew to inspect the holding of his would-be son-in-law and
liked what he saw. He gave the couple his blessing, and the other grantees of Lyman's Vermont town
agreed to let him name it for his fiancee. After the revolution, the young couple settled on their
Vermont land, and the 1790 census (actually taken in Vermont in 1791) listed Lyman Hitchcock as
head of a household of four people.
Cabot started out as an army town. When the town was officially organized, eight years after the
chartering, six out of seven people elected to fill town offices had been commissioned Continental
Army officers (the odd civilian was elected to the office of highway surveyor). The fact that soldiers
bought many of the charters sold by Vermont during the Revolution has engendered the mistaken idea
that the land was pay for their services. In fact, however, hard money changed hands, and went into
the treasury of the little republic. And the money was badly needed; the Continental Congress did not
pay any of Vermont's war expenses, because she was neither and old colony not yet recognized as a
separate, independent entity. Cabot did have what the proprietors of every town hoped for: good farm
lands, plenty of mill sites and no excessively high hills. At first the town grew quite rapidly, then after
the Civil War it started to decline. The population at present is somewhat less than it was thirty years
after the charter was written.
Material excerpted or adapted from Esther Munroe Swift's "Vermont Place Names: Footprints of
History."
*****************
N.B.
According to a direct descendant of Lyman Hitchcock and Sophia Cabot Hitchcock, at least one part of this story is not correct. Sophia's
father died when she was three months old. Therefore, he did not object to her marrying a soldier and could not have traveled to Cabot to survey the
land after Lyman invested in it...
How Cabot got its name.
It has been said that a man could live in Cabot for Seventy-Five years and have been a resident of four
counties without ever leaving his place of birth. The town has been successively part of the Vermont
counties of Cumberland, Orange, Caledonia and, since 1855, Washington. As far as can be discovered,
Cabot is the only town in Vermont to have been named as a result of a romantic attachment. Major
Lyman Hitchcock of Connecticut and Miss Sophia Cabot fell in love while Lyman was still in the
Continental Army. Sophia's father refused to let his daughter marry a soldier, and the lovers were
thwarted. Then Lyman got in on a Vermont grant in which he was the next-to-largest land buyer.
Sophia's father went north with a survey crew to inspect the holding of his would-be son-in-law and
liked what he saw. He gave the couple his blessing, and the other grantees of Lyman's Vermont town
agreed to let him name it for his fiancee. After the revolution, the young couple settled on their
Vermont land, and the 1790 census (actually taken in Vermont in 1791) listed Lyman Hitchcock as
head of a household of four people.
Cabot started out as an army town. When the town was officially organized, eight years after the
chartering, six out of seven people elected to fill town offices had been commissioned Continental
Army officers (the odd civilian was elected to the office of highway surveyor). The fact that soldiers
bought many of the charters sold by Vermont during the Revolution has engendered the mistaken idea
that the land was pay for their services. In fact, however, hard money changed hands, and went into
the treasury of the little republic. And the money was badly needed; the Continental Congress did not
pay any of Vermont's war expenses, because she was neither and old colony not yet recognized as a
separate, independent entity. Cabot did have what the proprietors of every town hoped for: good farm
lands, plenty of mill sites and no excessively high hills. At first the town grew quite rapidly, then after
the Civil War it started to decline. The population at present is somewhat less than it was thirty years
after the charter was written.
Material excerpted or adapted from Esther Munroe Swift's "Vermont Place Names: Footprints of
History."
*****************
N.B.
According to a direct descendant of Lyman Hitchcock and Sophia Cabot Hitchcock, at least one part of this story is not correct. Sophia's
father died when she was three months old. Therefore, he did not object to her marrying a soldier and could not have traveled to Cabot to survey the
land after Lyman invested in it...
Cabot Historical Society
P.O. Box 275
Cabot, Vermont 05647
P.O. Box 275
Cabot, Vermont 05647
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