The Public Records

Basic to any serious research in Connecticut history before 1894 are the twenty-six volumes of the transactions of the General Assembly, The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, J. Hammond Trumbull and Charles J. Hoadly, eds. (Hartford, 1850-1890), 15 vols.; and The Public Records of the State of Connecticut, Charles J. Hoadly, Leonard W. Labaree, Catherine Fennelly, Albert E. Van Dusen, Christopher Collier, Dorothy Lipson, and Douglas Arnold, eds. (Hartford, 1894-2001), 17 vols. These volumes contain all the resolutions, petitions, appointments, and other positive acts of the General Assembly from 1639 to 1816. Some volumes contain other appendix material, such as Governors' Proclamations, bits of the Journal of the House, and Minutes of the Council of Safety. No records of debates or of motions not passed and very few tallies of votes are included.  This body of work is an essential source of information about colony and state government, public policy, civil and military officers, and all sorts of private economic and personal disputes.

Other supplementary Published public records:

A.E.T., ed. Records of the Particular Court of the Colony of Connecticut: Administration of Sir Edmund Andros, Royal Governor, 1687-1688. Hartford, 1935. Privately printed pamphlet of forty-three pages. No editorial or scholarly apparatus.

Hinman, Royal Ralph, ed. Letters from the English Kings and Queens ... 1635-1749. Hartford: John B. Eldridge, 1836. Transcripts found in the office of the Secretary of the State.

Hoadley, Charles J., ed. Records of the Colony and Plantation of New Haven from 1638 to 1649. 2 vols. Hartford, 1857 1858. The manuscript records for 1649 to 1652 were lost, but Hoadley continues from 1653 to 1665, when New Haven was absorbed into Connecticut, in vol. 2.

"Records of the Particular Court of Connecticut, 1639-1663," CHS Collections 22(1928).

The Connecticut Register has been published continuously since 1785-except for 1787 and 1788--and now appears annually as the State Register and Manual. Until 1982 this fat volume was available free of charge from the Secretary of the State Now you have to send her $10 to get it. It contains updated lists of all state and local government officials, voting statistics for past years, population figures since 1790 for all towns, town and city data and much other information useful in studying past and present Connecticut There is a complete set dating from 1785 at the State Library. Other lists:

Connecticut General Assembly, Roll of State Officers and Members of the General Assembly of Connecticut from 1776 to 1881. Hartford, 1881. This work includes members of Congress, the state judiciary, and incorporation dates of towns, boroughs, and cities. Note errors in listings of governor and lieutenant governor in 1784 and 1786.

Hoadley, Charles J. "Judges and Members of the Superior Court from 1711 to the Present Time." Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors: American Law Reports, 53(1928):593.

Jacobus, Donald Lines, ed. List of Officials, Civil, Military, and Ecclesiastical of Connecticut Colony from March 1636 through October 1677 and of New Haven Colony Throughout Separate Existence also Soldiers in the Pequot War.... New Haven, 1935.

If you are really serious, you will want to work in the manuscript sources. They are described and discussed in the following:

Bates, Alben Carlos. Connecticut Statute Laws: A Bibliographical List of Editions of Connecticut Laws from the Earliest Issues to 1836. Hartford Case, Lockwood. 1900. An Acorn publication

Flaherty, David H. "A Select Guide to the Manuscript Records of Colonial New England." The American Journal of Legal History 11(1967): 107-26.

Mead, Nelson P. "Public Archives of Connecticut County, Probate, and Local Records." Annual Report of the American Historical Association for 1906. 2(Washington, 1906):53-64.

For the real scholar there are eighteenth- and nineteenth-century handbooks for civil officers detailing their duties and providing sample writs and other official forms. One of these is Samuel Whiting, The Connecticut Town Officer (Danbury: Nathaniel Skinner, 1814), which digests the laws pertaining to town, society, and school officers. John Goodrich, The Civil and Executive Officers Assistant (Hartford: Hudson and Goodwin, 1798), was published in about fifteen later editions with different compilers. It includes forms and procedures for selectmen, constables, grand jurors, etc.

Another source for serious scholars is Rose Harrison's list, "Connecticut Statistical Sources: A Guide to Materials in the Connecticut State Library," Connecticut State Library Document News Letter No. 7, November, 1973.