Collection: Milford Connecticut

What's with the Longest Green in New England? Run a line down the middle of Milford and you find the Green: about fourteen acres of lawn and old trees stretching along the Wepawaug River through the center of town, one of the longest town greens in all of New England. It is lined with war memorials, crossed by the 1889 Memorial Bridge with the founders' names cut into its stone, watched over by a 1910 fountain and one of the state's tallest flagpoles. It has been the town's front yard since 1639, and it is the best place to start the story.

That story begins on the water's edge. In February 1639, English settlers led by the Reverend Peter Prudden bought the land the Paugusset called Wepawaug from their chief sachem, Ansantawae, whose bow and arrow still appear on the town seal. The settlers arrived that August, making Milford the sixth-oldest town in Connecticut. A year later, in 1640, William Fowler built a water-powered grist mill by the river — the mill at the ford — and the town took its name. Among the first planters was Robert Treat, who settled here at fifteen, rose to be governor of Connecticut, and later led the group that founded Newark, New Jersey.

A mile off Silver Sands Beach sits the town's most famous riddle: Charles Island, which the Paugusset called Poquahaug. At low tide a natural sandbar — a tombolo — rises out of the Sound and you can walk to it. The best-loved Milford legend says that in 1699 Captain Kidd, on his way to arrest in Boston, buried treasure there, iron chests of gold said to lie beneath the rocks and never found. The island is now a state-protected bird sanctuary, its woods a nesting rookery of herons and egrets, closed to visitors through the spring and summer — so the legend is best enjoyed from the beach, and the crossing only with the tide chart in hand.

Milford has always worked the Sound. Long Island Sound made it a town of oystermen and shipbuilders: oystering began here in the 1750s, oyster huts lined the shore, and beds were farmed in Gulf Pond. The trade was open enough that by 1878 sixteen of the town's forty-one oystering permits were held by women. The oyster on our logo is not decoration — it is Milford's own working heritage, pulled from these waters for nearly three centuries.

The Revolution reached the shore, too. Patriots blockaded the Milford stretch of the Boston Post Road, built Fort Trumbull for defense, and kept a lookout from Liberty Rock in Devon. The hardest story is the gentlest: in the winter of 1777, some two hundred sick American soldiers were put ashore from a British prison ship, and a Milford man named Captain Stephen Stow chose to care for them. He caught the smallpox he was tending and died of it, and the town has remembered him ever since.

By the late nineteenth century the same shore had become a getaway. With seventeen miles of coast — Walnut Beach and its boardwalk, Gulf Beach, Milford Point at the mouth of the Housatonic — Milford grew into a summer resort for New Haven and Bridgeport. Today that coast holds Silver Sands State Park, often rated the finest in Connecticut, and the Audubon coastal center at Milford Point, where more than three hundred species of birds have been counted along the marsh.

The town still gathers where it always has. Since 1974 the Milford Oyster Festival has filled the Green and the downtown every August, growing into the largest single-day event in the state. Around it sits a historic downtown along the Wepawaug — the duck pond, the First Congregational Church, the Robert Treat Memorial Tower honoring the founders — a New Haven–area city that, through every change, has kept its harbor and its Green.

Our Milford logo carries Connecticut's oyster above ‘Connecticut — Est. 1636,’ the shared retro emblem of our Connecticut towns; the oyster stands for the Long Island Sound shellfishing that built so many of them, and 1636 marks the founding of the colony. Rendered in black-and-white, like an old crate label, it ties Milford to every other Connecticut town we make. What makes this one Milford is the town behind the shell — the long Green, the island offshore, and the oyster boats on the Sound.

So Milford gathers a 1639 green, a treasure island, an oyster festival, and seventeen miles of shore onto Long Island Sound. Our Milford designs gather that into wearable form. Wear the history. On the Wepawaug since 1639 — Milford, CT.

Milford, Connecticut — Travel Guide

Visiting Milford Today

Milford runs along Long Island Sound in New Haven County, with one of New England's longest town greens at its center, Charles Island just offshore, and seventeen miles of beaches, boardwalks, and harbor beyond. It blends a 1639 colonial downtown with a working shore — oyster boats, marinas, and a summer festival on the Green.

The Green, Charles Island & the Shoreline

For visitors looking for things to do in Milford, Connecticut:

• Walk the Milford Green, about fourteen acres and one of New England's longest, with its war memorials and the 1889 Memorial Bridge.
• Cross to Charles Island on the low-tide sandbar from Silver Sands — checking the tide chart, and keeping clear during the spring-summer bird-nesting closure.
• Stroll the Walnut Beach Boardwalk above the dunes, with the Firehouse Gallery mural nearby.
• Relax at Silver Sands State Park, often rated Connecticut's best, with its half-mile beach and salt marsh.
• Bird-watch at the Connecticut Audubon Coastal Center at Milford Point, where 300-plus species have been recorded.
• Explore Milford Harbor and the Wepawaug River downtown, with marinas, piers, and the duck pond.
• Visit the Milford Historical Society's colonial-era houses on Wharf Lane.
• Time a summer trip for the Milford Oyster Festival in August, the state's largest single-day event.

Why People Visit Milford

Milford balances a historic green, a legendary island, and miles of easy shoreline. Visitors enjoy simple seaside walks, boardwalks, and small cultural stops between the beaches and the harbor. It is peaceful, family-friendly, and close to nature, with year-round appeal in its parks, paths, and public spaces. History and everyday coastal life sit side by side here, from the long Green and the colonial downtown to the oyster boats and the boardwalk beyond.

Kindred Cities

Greetings to visitors from Cowes, England and Lunenburg, Canada — kindred harbour towns where the boats come first.

Milford has kept its life on the water, and Cowes and Lunenburg would feel at home in its harbour. Cowes, on the Isle of Wight, is the spiritual home of British yachting and its famous regatta; Lunenburg, in Nova Scotia, is the UNESCO-listed schooner town that built the Bluenose; Milford works its own long Connecticut harbour and oyster grounds on the Sound, with a historic green and a boardwalk beach beyond. Sails, shellfish and a tide that sets the day.

Milford suits anyone at home in a harbour town: a fleet on the Sound, oyster boats and yacht clubs, one of New England's largest town greens, and a long beach boardwalk for when the sailing's done. Come and visit us soon.

When you plan the trip, the City of Milford and the Connecticut Office of Tourism are the place to start.

For deeper reading on the Milford history described here — the 1639 founding on the Wepawaug and William Fowler's 1640 mill at the ford, the Milford Green and the 1889 Memorial Bridge, the Charles Island legend, the Revolutionary War shore and Captain Stephen Stow, and the oystering heritage behind the August festival — it may be useful to consult (1) the Milford Historical Society, (2) the Milford Public Library's local history room, (3) the Connecticut State Library and State Archives, (4) the City of Milford Town Clerk's records office, and (5) the Milford Preservation Trust and Historic District Commission. For travel and visitor information, it may be useful to contact (1) the City of Milford, (2) the Connecticut Office of Tourism, (3) the Milford Regional Chamber of Commerce, (4) Milford Parks and Recreation, and (5) Connecticut DEEP for Silver Sands State Park.