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The Courant reported that the future Asylum Hill Congregational Church would be located on a lot owned by William W. Turner, which was between West Middle District School and the house of Mark Howard. for traffic.
“D. W. Bartlett” was David W. Bartlett, an actual person in Hartford – but a person who had moved to Washington, DC in 1857. The Courant almost certainly meant “D. E. Bartlett,” who was David E. Bartlett. David E. Bartlett taught at the American School for the Deaf, which was right across the street from this house. The two David Bartletts were contemporaries but not apparently related to each other.
On February 19, 1864, the committee on site selection recommended a site for the future Asylum Hill Congregational Church, but this site was apparently rejected.
The Asylum Hill Congregational Society approved the site for the future church on June 29, 1864.
William W. Turner, a deacon, was the principal of the American School for the Deaf. This made him David Bartlett’s boss and landlord.
“There is a brick house now occupied by Mr. D. W. Bartlett, and that would have to come down, and then, a handsome lot running through from Farmington avenue to Asylum Avenue, very central, accessible on all sides, and making an eligible site for any public building, would strike the eye.”
This lot is roughly just to the east of Asylum Place, where The Hartford has a parking garage today. West Middle School would have been, at this point in time, approximately where Asylum Place is. All of this was directly across the street from the American School for the Deaf.
Keep, John R, “David Ely Bartlett,” The New Era, January 23, 1919 (vol. V, no. 1), pages 1-3.
Unattributed, “The New Church,” Hartford Courant, March 28, 1864, page 2.
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