Mattabesset River

{{short description|River in the U.S. state of Connecticut}}

{{Use American English|date=February 2025}}

File:Side view of Middletown Branch bridge, December 2016.JPG

The Mattabesset River as delineated on present-day maps flows out of Harts Ponds in the town of Berlin and travels {{convert|16.1|mi}} east to the Connecticut River, passing Kensington and later forming the boundary between Middletown and Cromwell.U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. [http://viewer.nationalmap.gov/viewer/ The National Map] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120329155652/http://viewer.nationalmap.gov/viewer/ |date=2012-03-29 }}, accessed April 1, 2011

Further south, the Coginchaug River (or "winding meadow") flows from an upland meadow in Durham, northwards to the Mattabesset just upstream of that river's junction with the Connecticut. This river was the route to the portage place, located near Palmer Field, just below Sowheag's main stronghold at Indian Hill. Since it was the old western boundary of the incorporated City of Middletown, it was also called the West River, and also, for no known reasons, it was given other names, including the Sebethe River and the Arrawanna River. Presumably{{clarify|date=June 2014}} the word Mattabeseck was never considered properly euphonious, and various local individuals tried to improve on the name poetically.