Old New-Gate was the site of the first chartered copper mine in the North American colonies and represented the kind of commercial enterprise colonists needed to reduce dependence on England. When mining began in 1707, English law barred colonial mine owners from smelting copper ore, forcing them to ship unprocessed ore across the Atlantic at great cost, and by the 1750s most mining had ceased because expenses exceeded revenue. In 1773, the General Assembly of colonial Connecticut converted the abandoned mine into a prison, using incarceration as an alternative to fines and punishments such as the stocks or pillory, and prisoners were locked in the underground tunnels, where some served their terms and many escaped. During the American Revolution, Loyalists and deserters from George Washington's army were also imprisoned there. After the turn of the 19th century, changes in criminal law greatly increased the prison population, and critics called New-Gate both cruel and costly. In 1827, the state closed the prison and moved imprisoned men and women to a new state prison in Wethersfield, Connecticut. From 1830 to 1857, the Phoenix Mining Company tried unsuccessfully to revive mining there, after which the site became a popular tourist attraction known for its horrid dungeon, Saturday night dances, zoo animals, and other curiosities. When the state purchased the site in 1968, it removed artifacts unrelated to the prison's history, and Old New-Gate thereafter operated as a prison museum.
