The war came to Westport by water. On the evening of April 25, 1777, some twenty-six British ships anchored off Compo Beach and landed about 1,850 troops under General William Tryon, who marched inland and burned the Continental supply depot at Danbury. The countryside rose behind them. On the return march the militia made the British pay, first at Ridgefield and then at the Battle of Compo Hill above the beach, where the redcoats finally cleared their way back to the ships with a bayonet charge. More than one hundred Continentals fell in the raid's engagements, among them General David Wooster, mortally wounded rallying his men.
Around 1910 something unexpected happened: artists. Illustrators, writers, and playwrights discovered the farmhouses and the shore light, and Westport became one of America's great arts colonies — F. Scott Fitzgerald rented a house on Compo Road South around 1920, and the Sound-shore world he found here is bound up with the one he later put into The Great Gatsby. In 1931 the players converted an 1835 tannery into the Westport Country Playhouse, still the town's stage today, and by mid-century the arts colony had settled into an affluent New York commuter town that never quite stopped being a colony.
Why People Visit Westport Connecticut
- Spend a day at Compo Beach, the town's Sound-front park, and find the Minute Man statue on the bluff above the 1777 landing site — the 1901 commemorative cannons stand nearby.
- Walk the Saugatuck River waterfront and the historic Saugatuck village, the colonial shipping center the town grew from, and cross the 1884 Cribari swing bridge.
- Catch a show at the Westport Country Playhouse, founded in 1931 in a converted 1835 tannery, or a summer concert at the Levitt Pavilion.
- Browse downtown Main Street and the river walk, with shops and galleries near the water.
- Kayak to Cockenoe Island off Compo, or walk Longshore's shoreline paths and public golf course.
- Drive a stretch of the Merritt Parkway for its celebrated 1930s bridges — no two are alike.
- Read up at the Westport Library before exploring the town's deep arts-colony history.
