Historic Sites in Barnet

Barnet's earliest settlements took advantage of the rivers for transport and for power. Village centers grew up around the mills on the rivers. Barnet Village on the falls of the Stevens River, McIndoes on the Connecticut, and East Barnet and Passumpsic (both of them had earlier names) on the Passumpsic River all featured grain mills and sawmills, and the Stevens River also powered cider mills and wood products mills from West Barnet through Barnet Center.

There was also a "bobbin" mill (wood) at Jewett Pond, in the present-day Roy Mountain Wildlife Management Area. Farms, brickyards, the railroad, and of course the homes of significant heroes of the town have also become historic sites in town. Click on the map to see where they are, and find descriptions for each.

Don't miss the Goodwillie House, where the double cellar wall may have hid escaped slaves as part of the Underground Railroad before and during the Civil War. The Barnet Historical Society offers exhibits at the Goodwillie House (open several times each year) and at the Barnet Village School (open year-round as part of the town library). Perhaps the most exciting historic spot to visit in Barnet is Ben Thresher's Mill, two miles west of Interstate 91 on the road that links Barnet and West Barnet villages.

Rogers' Rangers: The Barnet Story

Long before the United States existed as a country, people were exploring New England. They came from both England and France, as well as Scotland.

These nations often quarreled over the new land. In 1756, England formally declared war on France over the ownership of New England (as well as about shipping and trading), and the war would be called the French and Indian War.

Barnet's written history starts during this war, with a raid by an English team under Major Robert Rogers. After working their way up the west side of Vermont by Crown Point, Major Rogers and his group attacked the St. Francis Indians (notice the French name for this northern Indian group). The attack succeeded, and may have been one reason the French soon gave up the area.

But disaster was to follow the Rangers in the meantime. Their retreat through the cold wet weather took them to Lake Memphremagog and then the group split up, hoping that they might be able to find more food that way, hunting. The group with Major Rangers came toward Barnet through mostly swampy terrain, down along the Passumpsic River.

At an island at the mouth of the Passumpsic River, Round Island, near today's village of East Barnet, Rogers and his men hoped that General Jeffrey Amherst's group would meet them with food. They were starving. But the landscape was thick with trees and there were few trails to follow.

The two groups, the starving soldiers and the ones with food, probably were only a few miles from each other, but they never connected. Thirty-six of Rogers' Rangers died of starvation, and the rest scattered. Rogers and three companions, including an Indian boy named Billy, eventually managed to reach Fort No. 4 in Charlestown, New Hampshire, partly by building a crude raft to float down the Connecticut River (and they had no ax with them; can you imagine how they cut the logs?).

The disaster put Barnet into the news, even before it was called by the name Barnet. What a nightmare, all those heroic men starving to death in the northern wilderness!

 

Top: Early brick houses are rare in Barnet; this one is in Barnet Village. By Beth Dugger. Descriptive text and historical research and local photos on this page are contributed by Beth Kanell