If you walked up Village Hill before 1940, you would have seen the simple country home used as the parsonage by the earliest ministers of the First Congregational Church of Williamsburg, established in July 1771. It was originally a wide one-story house with an even older house joined at the back as an ell (torn down in 1840). The second minister, Reverend Joseph Strong (installed September 1781), added a second story in 1792 to accommodate his large family. Its life as a parsonage ended in 1803 with Reverend Strong’s death. But his family continued to live there for many years and the home remained in the Strong family for almost a century. The parsonage stood south of the earliest church building, on the west side of the road then known as “Meeting-House Hill.” The church itself, on the rise of the hill, was built in 1779 and razed in 1838. It stood near the current 33 Village Hill Road. The early parsonage lasted longer as a family home to various townsfolk. It burned in 1940. #throwbackthursday; #tbt
Posted to Facebook 7/15/21
