Reuben Hitchcock, the eldest child of Valentine Hitchcock, of Cheshire, Connecticut, and grandson of Peter and Hannah (Smith) Hitchcock, was born in Cheshire, then part of Wallingford, on January 4, 1764. His mother was Sarah, daughter of Captain Henry and Sarah (Benham) Hotchkiss, of Cheshire. A brother was graduated here in 1801. He united with the College Church, on profession of faith, in January of his Junior year. At graduation he won the Berkeley Scholarship.

He remained in New Haven after graduation, teaching school and studying theology, and was licensed to preach by the New Haven West Association on September 25, 1787. He was ordained before the issue of the Triennial Catalogue of Graduates in 1790, and preached for a time to the Society in the present township of Prospect, Connecticut, which was incorporated in October, 1787.

Later he went - presumably on account of his health - to the New England settlement in Sunbury, Georgia, where he took charge of the Congregational Church. He spent the summer of 1792 with his friends at the North, returning to Georgia in November.

He died at his home in Cheshire on July 4, 1794, aged 30 ½ years. Dr. Stiles describes him, in noticing his death, as “a pious, learned, and excellent young minister.” His little property - about 180 pounds - was left to his parents. He published: A Funeral Oration on the death of Mr. Elizur Belden, of Wethersfield, a Senior Sophister, in Yale-College: Who died April 8th, 1786… delivered in the College Chapel, June 8th. 1786, New Haven, 1786.

Source:
Dexter, Franklin Bowditch, Biographical Sketches of the Graduates of Yale College: With Annals of the College History, New York: H. Holt and Co., 1885-1912, Volume 5, pp. 484-485

Submitted by Bob Franks