James F. Rodgers. Courtesy of Dan W. DeLuca
Dan W. DeLuca has studied the Old Leather Man (pictured left) for 22 years and still does not know his real name.
However, there are a myriad of other details he presented at last month’s Loeb Lecture at the Blackstone Memorial Library that painted a clear picture of this itinerant individual, who visited Branford regularly in the mid to late 1800s.
A Meriden resident, DeLuca is a retired educator and historian. His years of research culminated with the publication of “The Old Leather Man: Historical Accounts of a Connecticut and New York Legend,” (Garnet Books) in 2008.
For more than 30 years, the Old Leather Man traveled between the Hudson and Connecticut Rivers through Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts and Vermont. From 1883 to 1889, he predictably covered a circuitous route of 365 miles over 34 days. For a time the route even stretched into Canada, where it was believed his French-Canadian grandfather lived. While he communicated with hand gestures and monosyllables. He was known to speak French when it was spoken to him.
Photo by Chip Stakes Viel
DeLuca, wearing – what else? – a leather jacket, said the Leather Man was first seen in 1856 and continued his circuit until his death on March 20, 1889, in Mt. Pleasant, N.Y., of blood poisoning due to cancer of his mouth. A couple found his body in a cave and his death made headlines in local newspapers. DeLuca has a copy of the death certificate.
He was dressed entirely in leather, garments weighing 60 pounds that he made from boot tops, and thick-soled shoes. He carried a leather knapsack (which held a French prayer book from 1844) and used a hickory walking stick. He loved tobacco and made his own pipes made out of tin cans, which he stashed in his caves.
DeLuca said he was born in 1839; he was 5‑feet, 7‑inches tall, with black hair and beard and blue-gray eyes. Chronologically he was not old – he was only 50 when he died – his appearance, and later his failing health, made him seem much older.
While the Leather Man’s appearance was intimidating, his personality was benign. Residents grew to anticipate his visits and were quick to offer him a meal, which he would eat in silence, then continue on his way. Children were let out of school to watch him as he passed by.
Such was the case in Branford. DeLuca explained that the Leather Man obtained a meal at Harding’s General Store (at 116 Montowese St.) consisting of a can of sardines, 10 milk crackers, a quarter of a pie, coffee, brandy and beer. (He was known to have a voracious appetite.)
Branford Historical Society, courtesy of Dan W. DeLuca.
He was also fed regularly by Mary Russell Harrison Chidsey, wife of Bradley Chidsey, who lived at the corner of Main Street and Home Place, where Shelley’s Garden Center is now located. The house (pictured) was eventually moved and now faces Home Place.
In between his visits to various towns, the Leather Man stayed in a network of caves, where he stored supplies and planted gardens. He even survived the Blizzard of 1888 in a makeshift hut in Southington.
It was in Branford that the now-iconic portrait of the Leather Man was taken by James F. Rodgers on June 9, 1885.
Branford resident Alfred Hammer wrote a series of articles about the Leather Man for the New Haven Palladian between Dec. 31, 1884, and Jan. 6, 1885. Hammer and Rodgers were friends and Rodgers subsequently earned the trust of the Leather Man enough to photograph him and provide a detailed interview at the hut he built on a ridge at Lake Saltonstall.
According to Rodgers, one day he and a friend waited for the Leather Man, who was startled by their appearance, but recognized Rodgers and answered a few questions while Rodgers sketched him; it helped that Rodgers spoke a little French. The Leather Man also produced some papers, which Rodgers determined, marked his different routes and records of his journeys. The interview appeared in the New Haven Register on June 11, 1885.
A portrait of the Leather Man that hung in the entrance to the Blackstone Library in the 1940s proved to be controversial. It had been on loan from Mrs. Mary Knight Kennedy. The 4‑foot by 6‑foot portrait was painted 1892 by A.V. Durant (after The Leather Man’s death) from a retouched photograph taken in 1888 by F.J. Moore in a Derby tavern. That tavern, the Nutshell, was owned by Frank Knight, the first husband of Mary Knight Kennedy of Short Beach, who knew of The Leather Man. The painting then hung in Mrs. Kennedy’s home for several years before being loaned to the Blackstone. When Miss Agnes Kennedy, a relative of Mary Kennedy, became the Derby librarian in 1950, she insisted that the painting be returned to Derby and hung in her library.
Rodgers earned enough money from the photographs of the Leather Man to enroll in Boston Art School. However, he was not in good health and died on Dec. 7, 1887, at the age of 21; he was buried in St. Mary’s Cemetery in Branford.
DeLuca explained that much of the original research by people such as Chauncey Hotchkiss and Leroy Foote has disappeared. DeLuca is lucky enough to have parts of their collections. Some articles have been donated to various historical societies.
He said that the volume of his research has doubled since the publication of his book and includes additional correspondence between Hammer and Rodgers.
For years it was thought the Leather Man was a Frenchman by the name of Jules Bourglay, who fled to the United States after a failed business venture led to a shattered romance. That was proven untrue.
DeLuca theorizes that his father was French-Canadian and his mother part Indian, and that he was raised by his mother’s grandfather, who taught him survival skills. That would explain his trips up to Canada.
One of Deluca’s goals has been to determine once and for all the identity of the Leather Man. DeLuca thought he had his chance earlier this year when the Leather Man’s grave in Sparta Cemetery in Ossining, N.Y., needed to be relocated due to its proximity to heavy traffic. With the assistance of Connecticut State Archaeologist Nicholas Bellantoni, the coffin was exhumed with the hope of finding some DNA evidence. However, the coffin was empty except for a couple of nails. The grave was originally marked by just a pipe until 1953 when it was replaced by a used headstone with the now-incorrect name, Jules Bourglay.
The wanderer clad in leather, who piqued the curiosity of locals for years, was reburied with a new headstone, reading simply, “The Old Leather Man.”
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