Augustus George Hazard (April 28, 1802 – May 7, 1868), known as Colonel Augustus Hazard, was an American

gunpowder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). Th ...

manufacturer and Hazardville, Connecticut's namesake. Hazard was born in

Kingston, Rhode Island Kingston is a village and a census-designated place within the town of South Kingstown in Washington County, Rhode Island, United States, and the site of the main campus of the University of Rhode Island. The population was 6,974 at the 201 ...

, on April 28, 1802, a son of Thomas and Silence Knowles Hazard. His family moved to

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its capita ...

when he was six years old. As a young man, he worked as a merchant in

Savannah, Georgia Savannah ( ) is the oldest city in the U.S. state of Georgia and is the county seat of Chatham County. Established in 1733 on the Savannah River, the city of Savannah became the British colonial capital of the Province of Georgia and later t ...

. In 1827 he relocated to New York City, where he was a commission agent engaged in selling gunpowder and other products. In 1837 he bought into a gunpowder production company that had been established two years earlier on the

Scantic River The Scantic River (pronounced SKAN-tik) is a river that flows through the states of Massachusetts and Connecticut and is tributary to the Connecticut River. The Scantic River's tributaries rise in the towns of Hampden, Wilbraham, East Longm ...

in the

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

Enfield, Connecticut Enfield is a town in Hartford County, Connecticut, United States, first settled by John and Robert Pease of Salem, Massachusetts Bay Colony. The population was 42,141 at the 2020 census. It is bordered by Longmeadow, Massachusetts, and East Long ...

. He assumed sole ownership of the company in 1843. The business was known thereafter as the

Hazard Powder Company The Hazard Powder Company is a former American manufacturer of gunpowder and explosives. It was located in Hazardville within the town of Enfield, Connecticut. History The company was founded on the Scantic River in 1835 by Allen Loomis ...

, and the village that supported it became known as Hazardville.Colonel Augustus Hazard
, Battleground Cigars website, accessed August 11, 2010 During the early years of the Civil War, Colonel Hazard was under suspicion by the federal government as being sympathetic to the Southern cause. It was well known that he was a good friend of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and that he lived in the South and had developed many business relationships. Shortly before South Carolina seceded from the Union, it bought 80,000 lbs. of powder that was used to propel the first shots fired on Fort Sumter. In fact, much of the powder in the Southern arsenals at the outset of the war was manufactured by the Connecticut company. The rapidly increasing demand for powder products compelled Hazard to hurry to expand his facilities to meet war time production needs. Soon Hazard Powder was supplying the Union Forces with 12,500 lbs of powder daily. The mill at Hazardville was in operation 24 hours a day and produced 40% of all the gunpowder used during the Civil War by the Union. Hazard lived on Enfield Street in Enfield, several miles from the powder mill, and ran the business until his death on May 7, 1868, at Ascot House in New York City.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hazard, Augustus George 19th-century American businesspeople People from Enfield, Connecticut People from South Kingstown, Rhode Island 1802 births 1868 deaths Hazard family of Rhode Island