diff --git a/CHANGES.txt b/CHANGES.txt
index e55ae28dd7..4c513d7ac3 100644
--- a/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/CHANGES.txt
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 3.11.3
+ * Fix cqlsh to read connection.ssl cqlshrc option again (CASSANDRA-14299)
  * Downgrade log level to trace for CommitLogSegmentManager (CASSANDRA-14370)
  * CQL fromJson(null) throws NullPointerException (CASSANDRA-13891)
  * Serialize empty buffer as empty string for json output format (CASSANDRA-14245)
diff --git a/bin/cqlsh.py b/bin/cqlsh.py
index 3abb3baf0a..801a8f799d 100644
--- a/bin/cqlsh.py
+++ b/bin/cqlsh.py
@@ -2244,7 +2244,7 @@ def read_options(cmdlineargs, environment):
 
     optvalues.debug = False
     optvalues.file = None
-    optvalues.ssl = False
+    optvalues.ssl = option_with_default(configs.getboolean, 'connection', 'ssl', DEFAULT_SSL)
     optvalues.no_compact = False
     optvalues.encoding = option_with_default(configs.get, 'ui', 'encoding', UTF8)