f his wife, Hannah, he was married to Mrs.
Deborah Lothrop, widow of John Gardiner, of Gardiner's Island, New York.

As his second wife had a fine property on Brooklyn Green, in the center
of the town, and as the entertainment of his numerous admirers (who
came from all over the country to see him) was becoming burdensome,
Farmer Putnam concluded to convert the newly acquired mansion into an
inn. So he moved himself and most of his belongings (including his stock
of war relics and anecdotes) from the farmhouse to the "Green," nearly
two miles distant, and there set up as "mine host" Putnam, putting out a
sign of the Wolfe--not of the beast he had slain in early life, but the
gallant general of that name who fell at Quebec. This veritable sign may
now be seen in Hartford, at the rooms of the Connecticut Historical
Society, where also are several other precious relics of Putnam and his
time, including some autograph letters by the hero himself.

Some one, long ago, wrote of this sign, which was affixed to one of the
great trees that stood in front of the tavern on the Green, "It
represents General Wolfe in full uniform, his eye fixed in an expression
of fiery earnestness upon some distant object, and his right arm
extended in emphatic gesture, as if charging on the foe or directing
some important movement of his army. The sign seems to have fared hardly
in one respect, being plentifully sprinkled with shot-holes!"

A contemporary wrote of him, about this time: "Col. Putnam served with
the Connecticut troops under Amherst in the last war. By his courage and
conduct he secured to himself a good share of reputation. When peace
commenced he returned to the civil line of life. Of late he has occupied
a tavern with a farm annexed to it."

As the landlord of a country tavern, the genial and loquacious colonel
with a past peculiarly his own, possessing the rotund figure, the frame
and habit of the traditional Boniface, seemed at last to have fallen
into his proper groove, where he fitted exactly. Now nearly fifty years
of age, with a record of ten years' fighting any one might well be proud
of, a reputation not confined within the boundaries of his own country,
and with some of his children already married and settled around him,
he had good reason to consider himself a fixture at Brooklyn Green.

He had joined the Congregational Church, soon after the death of his
first wife, in 1765, and took a leading part in building the s