Connecticut’s Greenwoods, or Western Lands, were explored in 1715 by John Marsh of Hartford, purchased for fifteen pounds from the Potatuck Indians, who called the area Bantam, and first settled in 1720. In 1751 the village became the seat of the newly organized county of Litchfield. Its position on inland stage routes between New York and New England towns fostered commerce, and during the American Revolution it served as a supply depot for the Continental Army and at times a holding place for Loyalist prisoners. In September 1780 General George Washington, accompanied by Alexander Hamilton and the Marquis de Lafayette, stayed there while traveling from a historic conference with French allies at Hartford. By 1784 Judge Tapping Reeve had established the first law school in America there, and in 1792 Miss Sarah Pierce opened a pioneering school for the education of females. By 1810 Litchfield was Connecticut’s fourth largest town, but being bypassed by railroads and large-scale water-powered industry, it declined in population for almost a century, preserving much of the architecture of its golden age. The town includes houses where Ethan Allen, Aaron Burr, John C. Calhoun, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Benjamin Tallmadge, and Oliver Wolcott lived or studied, and its village green and parts of North Street and South Street within the Borough have been designated a National Historic Landmark.