Darien CT Historic Homes: Pond-Weed House
Built around 1700 on the old Boston Post Road, Darien’s Pond-Weed House is a classic Connecticut salt box with a large central stone fireplace and a sloping back that slopes toward the roofline. It is considered the oldest house still standing in Darién.
In 1692, Nathaniel Pond, listed as “Branford’s Blacksmith”, purchased the land on which the Pond-Weed House stands, near the ford and former sloop landing stage on the Noroton River. Settlement began in the Darien around 1700 when the first roads were “cut into the forest.”
The Noroton Cove settlement that eventually became Darien included a dammed sawmill on the Noroton River, a small shipyard on the shore of Holly Pond, and Nathaniel Pond was the blacksmith. In 1703 a school district was established.
Shortly after the initial structure of the Pond-Weed House was built, several additions were made to the core structure, resulting in a two-story house, a T-shaped floor plan, and a sloped roofline. the saltbox. Nathaniel Pond sold the property to Nathaniel Weed in 1716 “With dwelling house and barn.” He remained in the Weed family for 210 years.
Notable features of the Pond-Weed House include the massive stone fireplace, tiled exterior walls with semicircular ends, a first period exterior door, exposed sills, paneling, and much remaining antique ironwork.
In addition to its historical architectural importance and its connection to the main families of Darién, the building also served as a tavern in the 18th century when it was known as the “House Under the Hill” or “Casa de Medio Camino” due to its middle position – road between Norwalk and Stamford.
In the late 1730s, severe winter storms killed several people traveling from Darien to the church in Stamford. As the first generation of Darién settlers aged, they proposed creating a newer, closer parish to reduce the difficulty of getting to church on Sundays.
In 1744 this led to the recruitment of the Rev. Moses Mather, still in his early 20s, he spent his entire 64-year career in this parish post until his death in 1806. Moses Mather became one of the most outspoken advocates from the pulpit of American independence during the Revolutionary War.
The city was dominated primarily by patriots during the Revolution and the community’s conservatives fled to Long Island, but raided the community during the war. The plaque in front of Darien City Hall tells the story of how “the Tories broke up services at the meetinghouse on July 22, 1781, seized Dr. Mather and forty-seven other men, and transported them across the Sound. Dr. Mather with Twenty-six of his parishioners suffered five months in the filthy British prisons of New York City before those who survived their confinement were exchanged and returned to their homes.”
It has long been said of the Pond-Weed House when it operated as the Half-Way House Tavern that “George Washington stopped here” on the march south from Boston to New York during the American Revolution.
Today, the Pond-Weed House is a private residence located at 2591 Post Road Darien, Connecticut, just west of the junction of Post Road and Hollow Tree Ridge Road. This solid example of early New England architecture that is the oldest standing house in town makes it one of the most important historic houses in Darien, Connecticut.
