American Union Lodge No. 1 - Onondaga and Oswego Masonic ...

Vermont's oldest log cabin reveals how early settlers lived.
HISTORY OF CAPTAIN JEDEDIAH HYDE, JR.
Jedediah Hyde, Jr. was born in Norwich, Connecticut in 1761. His father, Captain Jedediah Hyde, later became a prominent
resident of a town which was named Hyde Park in his honor. Captain Hyde fought at the Battle of
Bunker Hill, then joined Captain William Coit’s Connecticut Grenadiers. The younger Hyde was in
school at the time of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, but like many of his generation, enlisted
at the age of fourteen, joining his father in the Connecticut Grenadiers. Jedediah Hyde, Jr. served
in various capacities during the war. One of his assignments was in Captain Rufus Putnam’s
Corps of Engineers, where he undoubtedly learned something
about surveying. At Bennington, from among the spoils of war,
he was given a surveyor’s compass and a theodolite which he
would use later in surveying Grand Isle and other parts of
Vermont.
< In 1945, the cabin was moved to its current location.
A thorough stabilization project in 1945 preserved the cabin for
future generations >.
In the summer of 1783, Jedediah Hyde, Jr. and his father came to Grand Isle as surveyors of the
island. Four years earlier Ira and Ethan Allen had modestly named the island “The Two Heroes,”
and, with Governor Thomas Chittenden, parceled out grants to the Green Mountain Boys. Most of
the grantees sold their rights and Captain Hyde purchased several parcels on what would later be
called Grand Isle. These deeds are in the office of the South Hero Town Clerk and were recorded
June 12, 1783. On one of his father’s parcels, Jedediah, Jr. built this cabin, which served as a home to various members of the
Hyde family for nearly 150 years. The original site was approximately two miles southwest of the cabin’s present location.
In the cabin today are maps of the county’s original grants, furnishings from the cabin and other homes in the county, agricultural
and household implements from the area, and other items relating to the history and settlement of Grand Isle.
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