This house was built around 1831 by William Silcox, son
of Robert Silcock, who was the only known British soldier of the American
Revolution buried in Longmeadow Cemetery. Records of original deed for
this house are rather confusing, but it appears that the land on which
this house sits was granted to Robert Silcox in 1794. The grant measured
100 feet long and 30 feet wide "ten rods north of the Hatter's Shop as a
homelot". The front two rooms made up the original house; the second floor
and the ell were probably added later. In 1840 William built another
house beside the "homestead" for his sister Julia. In 1913 Julia’s house
was torn down to make way for the construction of Greenacre Avenue.
William’s son Robert Spencer Silcox was a broom maker by trade. A
financial crash in 1837 forced him, at age 19, to move to Ohio for
employment. In his diary he writes of his journey, commencing in
Thompsonville CT, including this passage: “On December 4, 1837, my Uncle
Walter Bliss took me and my trunk to Thompsonville. On this morning I bid
my parents goodbye . . . I took the steamboat Massachusetts that plyed the
Connecticut River from Springfield to Hartford. We ran over the falls in
the Connecticut River just below Thompsonville, how I do not know, for in
these years (1893 presently) no boat can go over them as there is a dam
across the river to throw the water into a canal that furnishes water
power at Windsor Locks.”