Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography/Morgan, Miles

MORGAN, Miles, soldier, b. in Bristol, England, in 1616; d. in Llandaff, Wales, 28 May, 1699. Being a younger son and of venturesome disposition he conceived the idea of joining one of the many vessels that conveyed emigrants to America from his native town. He arrived on one of these at Boston in April, 1636, and soon afterward penetrated, with an expedition headed by a Col. Pyncheon, into the wilderness, and settled at what is now Springfield, Mass., building for himself a fortified block-house on the bank of Connecticut river on the site that is now occupied by the car-shops of the Connecticut River railroad. Soon after settling in Springfield he married Prudence Gilbert, a fellow-passenger on the voyage from Bristol. At the sack of Springfield, Capt. Morgan's block-house became the fortress of the place, and, after the burning of the settlement, held out until messengers had been despatched to Hadley, and thirty-six men (the standing army of the colony of Massachusetts bay), under command of Capt. Samuel