Historical Name: Charter
Common Name: White Oak
Latin Name: Quercus alba
In 1662 England’s King Charles II granted Connecticut a colonial charter, permitting self government. By the early 1680’s King James II became concerned with how independent the colony had become, and in 1687 annulled the charter and ordered Sir Edmond Andros, the Governor of the Dominion of New England, to take a group of soldiers to Hartford to retrieve the charter and appoint new leaders. A few evenings after his arrival, Andros met with the Colony’s Governor and Legislators in a room dimly lit by candles. The charter was opened on the table when, according to legend, the candles were suddenly extinguished. When they were relit, the charter was gone. Captain Joseph Wadsworth had picked up the charter during the confusion of darkness and fled to hide it within the hollow trunk of a large old White Oak. Andros nevertheless assumed control of the colony, but never retrieved the charter. The document was saved and later was utilized as the State’s constitution both before and after the Revolution. The tree in which it had been hid that fateful evening forever more was known as the Charter Oak, and became the most well known and beloved tree in Connecticut.
In 1856 a storm toppled the tree, and its age was estimated to be between 800 and 1000 years. An offspring of the tree was planted in Hartford as a replacement, and that tree survived until 2023. As a testament to how close the original tree still is to the hearts of Connecticut’s residents, it was chosen to serve as the symbol of their State when the Connecticut quarter was minted in 1999. This tree is a “grandchild” of the Charter Oak, grown from a seed collected from the Charter Oak’s offspring, and was planted into UCNJ’s Historic Tree Grove in 2004.