Haddam Town Hall is located at 30 Field Park Drive, Haddam CT 06438.
Phone: 860‑345‑8531.
Beginnings [1]
The first purchase or occupancy of the land within the limits of Haddam by Englishmen, of which there is any account, was about 1652 when Captain John Cullick, who had for some time been secretary of the colony of Connecticut, having extinguished the Indian title, obtained a confirmatory grant from what was then called Twenty Mile Island, later Lord's Island, and a tract on the east side of the Connecticut River near it, the dimensions of which are not given. Cullick probably made little or no improvement to his land previous to the settlement of Haddam.
The locality and afterward the newly organized town took its name from Thirty Mile Island. Individuals contemplated making a settlement here as early as 1660, and in October of that year the Legislature accordingly appointed a committee to purchase the lands from the Indians. Negotiation was not completed for two years, with the purchase finally made May 20, 1662, when the committee consisting of Matthew Allyn and Samuel Willys obtained from four kings and two queens of the Indian tribes that occupied them, a deed for these lands.
Soon after the purchase a company of 28 men from Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield, in whose behalf the purchase had been made, entered upon the land and commenced improvement. These men were: Nicholas Ackley, Joseph Arnold, Daniel Brainerd, Thomas Brooks, Daniel Cone, George Gates, Thomas Shailer, Gerrard Spencer, John Spencer, William Ventres, John Bailey, William Clarke, Simon Smith, James Wells, James Bates, Samuel Butler, William Corbee, Abraham Dibble, Samuel Ganes, John Hannison, Richard Jones, Stephen Luxford, John Parents, Richard Piper, Thomas Smith, Joseph Stannard, John Webb, and John Wyatt. The first 10 named above are known to have come from Hartford.
They are supposed to have been mostly young men, many of whom were just married. They paid back the expense of the purchase by installments as they were able.
It is probably that the settlement progressed slowly and no formal or systematic organization of the society was effected within three or four years from the date of purchase.
The town was incorporated in 1668 and named Haddam, for a place of the name Haddam (or Hadham) in England.