Settlement by New London pioneers in conquered Pequot Indian country began along the river at Allyn's Point and Poquetanuck in 1653, then spread down the Indian trail to Mystic. At the Center, in 1725, the precise center of the area that became Ledyard was chosen as the site for the new North Parish church of Groton, and the militia training field was moved there. On September 6, 1781, that militia supported Fort Griswold defender Colonel William Ledyard when Benedict Arnold sacked New London and Groton, and one-third of those massacred came from this North Parish. After a slow recovery, the people chose in 1836 to name their new town in memory of their leader. Gales Ferry, the first village, founded in 1740, sheltered blockaded Commodore Decatur from British attack during the War of 1812. For nearly one hundred years, from 1878 to 1975, Yale and Harvard crews trained there for their annual four-mile race along the Thames. Ledyard was also the birthplace of Silas Deane, envoy to France during the Revolution; Samuel Seabury, the first Episcopal Bishop of Connecticut; and Jonathan Whipple and Zerah Whipple, Quakers who founded the Whipple Home School for Deaf Mutes, now the Mystic Oral School.