Remembering Colebrook's Iron House

If you remember the account of how the Iron House was built, you may recall I have said that prior to 1945 or ’46, very few people knew its exact location. Here is why I chose those dates:

When I was growing up in the 1930s and ’40s, almost every hunter in these parts had a story to tell about his involvement with the Iron House. They had come across it while hunting, and as a glance at a topographical map of the area will attest, there is an awful lot of forest-covered topography hereabout. To complicate the picture, Colebrook’s north boundary is the Massachusetts border.

Years ago Connecticut did not have a deer season, but Massachusetts did. Nobody in Colebrook that I heard of ever owned a Massachusetts hunting license, but it was amazing how many times seasoned woodsmen from town, who knew the local woods like the back of their hand, used to become completely disoriented when the Massachusetts hunting season began.

If apprehended, something that I never heard of happening, the excuse would have been that they thought they were in Colebrook. Well, the boundary isn’t very well marked, but still and all, after hunting season was over and before it began, most could have located it within a few yards.

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I asked Ed Merritt if he knew the location of the Iron Horse. He answered with an enthusiastic yes. He had seen it several times, and it was located on top of Monument Mountain on the state line at the north end of Colebrook River. It was right on the summit. You couldn’t miss it.

My father and I climbed Monument Mountain and walked over every square inch of the summit as well as a good percentage of the lower slopes, but there was no sign of any building, iron or otherwise.

I asked Harry Williams, surely one of the best hunters and fishermen who ever called Colebrook home. Yes, he knew the Iron House well; it was atop Pond Mountain in Colebrook, just south of Simons Pond. It was right at the top, you couldn’t miss it.

Pulling on our hiking boots, my father and I again climbed a mountain to see the elusive Iron House. Combing every square foot of the summit proved that it wasn’t there and it never had been.

Felix Jasmin knew his way around and through all of our hills and ridges. When asked, he replied that of course he had seen the Iron House, the latest time being last season — it sits atop a mountain just north of Simons Pond in Sandisfield. (I don’t recall whether or not he knew the name.) My father and I got ready and headed out one last time.

The only thing all of the people who claimed to have seen the building agreed upon was that it sat at the exact summit. They had all seen it, but most weren’t sure where they were at the time, and couldn’t contest being mildly lost.

When we figured we were about halfway up Bull Mountain, we separated, one going to the right, the other to the left, always slightly increasing the elevation. When almost at the summit, we met, and about the time we figured that this was another dry run, we both almost barked our shins on part of the stone structure. It was so well camouflaged that you could stand a few scant feet away and still not see it. Once you became accustomed to looking at it, it was much more recognizable, but the first time you saw it was almost scary.

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No part exceeded 10 or 12 feet in height at the most. The building is no more than 25 feet square with one doorway facing south. The first time we saw the site, the door was leaning against the south wall. It looked for all the world like a medieval castle door; it must have been 6 inches thick with heavy, ornate hinges and latch and iron straps. There was a small pile of badly weathered bags of cement nearby. Off to the southeast, about 50 yards away, was the location of the quarry where all the stone had been extracted. (Incidentally, when standing at the quarry, a beautiful, clear view of the Colebrook River Dam and Reservoir can be seen.)

There are three or four openings for windows. The builder had intended that there be two rooms on the first floor, defined by a stone wall with a door opening not more than 1 foot wide. How he intended that someone could pass from one room to the other is beyond me. It was tight for me then; I doubt that I could make it today!

As we left, we discovered that the south face of the mountain was nearly a perpendicular wall, whereas if you approached from the north, you were confronted by a very gradual slope. The trick was to approach from Roberts Road, running a quarter of a mile north of the building.

Returning from the building and by going due north, you will intercept the road, whereupon you will turn left (west) and proceed to the intersection of Beech Hill Road (the Sandisfield version), and go left again (south) past the lake and eventually on to Simons Pond Road in Colebrook.

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We did not possess this knowledge for long when we were in the barnyard one day and an auto pulled up at the end of our driveway. Several people were in the car, and one exited and approached us and after searching (without much luck) for the right words, asked if we had ever heard of an Iron House in these parts. When we nodded “yes,� the fellow became almost animated, he was so happy. He turned and ran back to the car yelling as he went that we knew about the Iron House.

Here is what was happening: The war had just ended. He had been in the Army in Europe and while pinned down in a foxhole with another soldier for three days under heavy fire, talked about hunting and fishing and all the things they missed doing. The other soldier was from Sandisfield, and told about the Iron House, and the fellow we were talking to was from Feeding Hills, Mass. If they succeeded in getting out of this alive, he wanted to buy that house.

It became an obsession with him, and when the gods of war allowed him to survive, he came home and immediately began searching for any information on the location. He soon found that there was precious little. As a matter of fact, nobody knew exactly where the property was. He had purchased a tract of land that the town clerk had said was known as Bull Mountain, but it was very isolated and didn’t contain any building that she knew of — at least no taxes were ever paid on any structure. But he now owned it, and his family kept telling him that he had been fooled into buying a worthless piece of forestland. They were convinced that there wasn’t an Iron House there or anywhere else, and had almost succeeded in convincing him that they were right.

Our assertion that we knew of it made a new man of him. He wanted to know if we could take him there, and my father said that I would be happy to do so. “When could I do that?� It must have been around midday, because I said we could leave right now, if they wanted. And that is what we did. I led an expedition to the Iron House, and honestly, he was the happiest fellow I think I ever saw!

Along about 2004 or ’05, someone bought the property and put in a passable road nearly to the building, or so I’ve been told. I don’t care any more, preferring to remember the old place before the hands of modern civilization put its stamp on it.

Bob Grigg is the town historian in Colebrook.