USA > Connecticut > Historic towns of the Connecticut River Valley > Part 23
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The population of Enfield continued to increase. In 1692 pitches were made in the southern portion of Enfield and in 1706, people moved from the center to the eastern portion of the town and made a settlement in what is now Somers. Scitico was set- tled about 1713. In 1693, there was a boundary war between Enfield and Windsor, that was founded upon the careless survey made by Woodward and Saffery, in 1642. Windsor claimed that the southern boundary of Enfield was two miles too far south, and Enfield denied it. The matter was fought through the courts for twenty years, and must have been a "gold-mine " to the law- yers of both towns. In 1713, the dispute was settled by an har- monious compromise. Enfield's first representative to the Gen- eral Court of Massachusetts was Joseph Parsons of Springfield, in 1705. From that year till the town was annexed to Connecti- cut, Enfield's representation was intermittent. In 1734, the east- ern portion of the town was set off and incorporated as the Town of Somers. From 1716, till 1752, the inhabitants of Enfield strove to force Massachusetts to agree that the town was within the jurisdiction of and a part of Connecticut, and although Captain Ephraim Pease and Captain Elijah Williams took their seats in the Legislature of Connecticut in October, 1749, as the repre- sentatives of Enfield, that town was not annexed to Connecticut till 1752. In the Indian Wars, the Revolution, and the War of 1812, Enfield was as liberal with its men and as active in its patriotism, as were all the towns of the Colony.
In 1683, the work of building a meeting-house was begun, but a minister was not settled for a number of years, not till 1699, when the Rev. Nathaniel Collins became its first minister. A Baptist Church was organized in 1750, with the Rev. Joseph Meacham its pastor, but it soon ceased to exist and Mr. Meacham
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became one of the first American converts of the Shakers. Dis- cord in the Baptist Church resulted in the organization of a Society of Shakers in 1788.
The first bridge across the Connecticut River, in the State of Connecticut, was built in 1808, from Enfield to Suffield. It was thirty feet wide, 1,000 feet long, and was supported by six mason-work piers. The bridge cost a little less than $26,000.
In 1679, the Committee appropriated forty acres to be im- proved and worked for the support of a school, but the school was not organized till 1703. A schoolhouse was built in 1704, and John Richards was its first schoolmaster. The Town paid him f14 a year and the parents of all children of five years old and over were assessed a small sum which was added to his salary. In addition, the Town promised him twenty acres of land, should he continue to teach in the school for five years.
With the exception of a small ironworks on the Scantic River, in the eastern part of the town, that was established in 1802, there was little or no manufacturing in Enfield, the people being employed in working their farms, until 1828. In that year Orrin Thompson organized the Thompsonville Manufacturing Com- pany, for the manufacture of carpets, the factory being in Thomp- sonville near the mouth of Freshwater River.
Among the most prominent families of Enfield, in the different periods of its existence, were those of the name of Pease, Thomp- son and Dixon. John Pease, Sr., the first settler of Enfield - or Freshwater as it was then called - was born in England in 1630. He came to New England with his parents while he was still a child. They settled in eastern Massachusetts where the father died, not long after arriving in New England. John was left to the care of his grandmother -- who came over with the family, or was already in Massachusetts when John and his parents arrived -- and soon after she died. John was left by her will to the care of Thomas Wadeson, who brought him up and gave him what education he had. John Pease was married twice ; his first wife being Mary Goodell, of Salem, Massachusetts; and his second, Ann Cummings, of Topsfield, Massachusetts. John settled in Salem and lived there till he moved with his sons to Freshwater - Enfield - in 1681, where he died on July 8, 1689.
Of the two sons who settled Freshwater with their father,
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John, Jr., became the more prominent. He was, in fact, the most prominent man in the early history of Enfield. He was born in Salem, on May 30, 1654, and was twenty-seven when he went to Enfield with his father, and brother Robert. He had served his apprenticeship as a carpenter and joiner before leaving Salem and besides working at his trade, he was interested in all matters of interest to the town, and was an active worker for its advance- ment and its welfare. His official life began when he was elected the first constable of Enfield, and it continued, in one office or another, for many years. He was surveyor of the town ; a mem- ber of the first board of selectmen, elected at the first Town meet- ing; and the first captain of militia in Enfield. His wife was Margaret Adams, of Ipswich, Massachusetts, whom he married on January I, 1677. His death occurred in Enfield, in 1734, in the eightieth year of his age. Elisha M. Pease, a descendant of the first settler, was born in 1812. He moved to Texas when a young man, where he practiced law and was later elected Gov- ernor of the State. He was Provisional Governor, by appoint- ment of General Sheridan, in 1867.
Of the Thompson family, Orrin Thompson was the most promi- nent in the affairs of Enfield, and may be regarded as the father of Enfield's manufacturing interests. Although he was born in Suffield, on March 28, 1788, his family moved to Enfield while Orrin was still a boy of twelve years. He attended the West- field, Massachusetts, Academy and in 1805, went to Hartford and was apprenticed to a store-keeper, where he obtained a thorough business training. At the age of twenty-one he went to Jewett City, Connecticut, as a clerk in a manufacturing concern. In 1812, he was in that portion of the army that was stationed at · Stonington, when a British attack was expected. At the age of twenty-six, in 1814, Mr. Thompson returned to Enfield and opened a store, which he conducted with success. The possi- bilities of a store being somewhat limited, Mr. Thompson went to New York and entered the firm of David Andrews and Com- pany. The firm sold carpets. This business suggested the idea of manufacturing carpets, so Mr. Thompson organized the fa- mous Thompsonville Carpet Manufacturing Company, in 1828, and later reorganized it as the Hartford Carpet Company. His wife was Miss Love Lusk, of Enfield, whom he married in 1815.
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T HE mother settlement of the Valley of the Connecticut in Massachusetts is Springfield and the father of Spring- field was. William Pynchon, a man of gentle-birth and refinement, who was a landed proprietor in Essex, England. Besides being one of the patentees of the charter of the Massa- chusetts Colony, he was appointed a magistrate and assistant, when the Governor and other officers of the Colony were ap- pointed in England, in 1629. He was one of Governor Win- throp's party which settled in Roxbury in 1630.
After five years spent in Roxbury an uneasiness possessed the people of that settlement and so a petition was presented to the General Court for permission to go elsewhere. On May 6, 1635, the Court granted the petition, with reluctance, to the inhabitants of the several towns which were interested in the proposed exodus. William Pynchon and his followers receiving permission to go where they liked, if their like did not take them out of the jurisdiction of Massachusetts, and did not encroach upon, or in- terfere with any other plantation, chose the Connecticut River.
In the summer of 1635, Pynchon sent two men to the Connecti- cut River, at the place called Agawam by the Indians, to build a house so that when the other settlers arrived, a place of shelter would be ready for them. These men were John Cable and John Woodcock. It is probable, however, that Pynchon and his son- in-law Henry Smith, and Jehu Burr visited the Connecticut Val- ley, in 1634, to explore and select a site for a settlement and that Agawam was their choice. If this is fact, it shows that Pynchon had made the long journey through the forest the year previous to the permission granted by the General Court for the exodus. Cable and Woodcock built a house on the south bank of the Agawam and the west of the Connecticut River. The cost of this house, the first built in Massachusetts in the Con- necticut Valley, was £6 and the expense was borne by the pro- spective settlers. These two men lived in the house they had built during the summer of 1635. There is nothing to show
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whether they remained there through the following winter or if they returned to Roxbury in the autumn of 1635. This first house was the cause of the first law-suit for damages in Massa- chusetts west of old Middlesex County, and Woodcock was the plaintiff while his fellow pioneer and house-builder, Cable, was the defendant. This historic trial took place on November 14, 1639, before William Pynchon.
On April 26, 1636, the possessions of the settlers were sent by water in the ship belonging to Governor Winthrop called " Bless- ing-of-the-Bay " and the settlers started - exactly when is not known - sometime just before or after April 26, for their fu- ture home on the Connecticut River. That they arrived before May 14, 1636, is certain. On that date William Pynchon and his company met and adopted rules relative to town government and the division of the land. These rules were signed by William Pynchon, Matthew Mitchell, Henry Smith, Jehu Burr, William Blake, Edmond Wood, Thomas Ufford, and John Cable. Al- though but eight persons signed the rules there were twelve heads of families in the company, the four others being Thomas Woodford, John Reader, Samuel Butterfield, and James Wood. It is an odd fact that not one of the first settlers of Springfield died there. They either moved to other settlements in the valley, returned to England, or were totally lost sight of.
The settlers were welcomed by the Indians, who were disposed to be on friendly terms with the English. The Indians told the settlers that the place where Cable and Woodcock had built the house was not a favorable site for the settlement, as it was fre- quently flooded by the river in times of high water. Because of this information the west bank of the river was abandoned for the settlement and a site was chosen upon the east bank, where now is the city of Springfield. The settlement was called Aga- wam till 1640, when the name was changed to Springfield. The settlers desired to have at least forty families in the settlement and in the rules signed by the eight men, they agreed that it should not contain more than fifty families. The first Indian decd bears the date of July 15, 1636, and was made to Pynchon, Smith and Burr. The houses of the little settlement were all built before the cold weather of 1636 had set in, and although they were made of logs with straw-thatched roofs, they were
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homes, warm and comfortable in a homely way. Although very different from the comfort and luxury to which the majority of the settlers had been accustomed, in old England, they were en- tirely satisfactory in New England, to these men and women who had come here to devote themselves to the serious and nobler things of this life, that they might be better prepared to enter the Life that never ends.
William Pynchon was an extraordinary man. Wise, broad- minded, just and generous as he was, his own fellow pioneer Christians in Boston failed to see it and appreciate him, so they robbed all New England of a man whose life and influence would have been felt to its utmost limits, could he have remained in the Colonies. It was the narrow bigotry of the Government and Church of Boston; a bigotry that was more intense than was the bigotry in England which they had crossed the ocean to be rid of ; that drove Pynchon back to England.
'In 1637, the settlers organized the first Church of Springfield and settled the Rev. George Moxon as its minister, and the first meeting-house was finished in 1646. In 1636, William Pynchon was reelected as an Assistant of the Colony and while he did not attend the May Court of Elections, he was present in Sep- tember and took the oath of office as a magistrate. Roger Lud- low, who had been a Deputy Governor and a magistrate of Mas- sachusetts, and was one of the prominent men in Windsor, was commissioned by the General Court, with William Pynchon and others, to govern the new settlement, in 1636. Ludlow's com- mission was for one year and was renewed in 1637. In 1637, Massachusetts ceased to have jurisdiction over the adjoining towns south of Springfield in Connecticut, and Springfield re- mained with the Connecticut towns till 1639, William Pynchon actually attending the General Court in Hartford as a magis- trate. As has been shown in the chapters on Enfield and Suf- field, Connecticut, Pynchon believed that he and his settlement were within the jurisdiction of the Connecticut Colony. Early in the year 1639, Springfield was found to be within the juris- diction of Massachusetts when its union with the Connecticut towns ceased. This left Springfield without a town government or any one to administer justice, as the General Court of Massa- chusetts had sent no instructions, so the inhabitants drew up a
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form of government and elected William Pynchon as their magis- trate. This was to continue only till the General Court should send instructions. When word was received from the Court, the action of the inhabitants was approved and Pynchon was con- firmed in his office. Pynchon was chosen an Assistant of the Colony. from 1643, to 1649, inclusive.
In 1652, Springfield sustained a great loss in the return to England of William Pynchon, Henry Smith, his son-in-law ; and the minister, the Rev. George Moxon. This calamity was due to
OLD DAY HOUSE, WEST SPRINGFIELD.
a book written by Pynchon, the title of which was, "The Mer- itorious Price of Man's Redemption." It was published in Eng- land, and contained ideas so liberal and opinions so different from those of the Puritans - which, being their ideas and opinions, were of necessity orthodox - that the General Court tried, con- demned and executed the book by publicly burning it in the mar- ket-place in Boston. The holy orgy that those narrow, misguided. well-meaning orthodox men of Boston had at the burning must have been a sight worth going many miles to witness. In look- ing back to that event one can imagine how their infinitesimal
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humanity must have shriveled to even smaller proportions as the frigid blood - warmed to somewhere near temperate heat by their religious ardor - became a degree or two warmer while forcing its way through their dessicated hearts, stimulated to this unusually rapid flowing by the religious exhilaration caused by the knowledge that they were establishing their own tiny opin- · ions more firmly. This was doubtless called, serving God. The General Court suspended William Pynchon from the magistracy and so deprived not Springfied, nor the Colony of Massachusetts, but all New England, of a man whose love of God and man was so great, that there were not enough men in the town where his book was burned to surround that love.
The Court appointed Henry Smith in 1651, to act as magis- trate for Springfield for one year, or till further orders were re- ceived. Pynchon and his son-in-law, Henry Smith, returned to England in 1652 and never again were in New England. It is probable, however, that Smith expected to return, as he left his wife and two daughters in Springfield. Three or four years later Mrs. Smith joined her husband in England but their daughters remained and married men in Hartford. The cause for the re- turn of the Rev. George Moxon to England was not known. Some authorities think it was due to the fact, that he was a believer in Pynchon's advanced ideas ; others, that it was due to witch- craft.
The first case of witchcraft recorded in New England was in Springfield. The persons suspected, accused and tried for prac- ticing the arts of Satan, were Hugh Parsons and his wife. Mr. Moxon's daughters, Martha and Rebekah, were attacked by an illness which was attributed to witchcraft. Mrs. Parsons was afflicted by occasional attacks of insanity and her neighbors at- tributed her condition to a social intimacy with the devil. It hardly seems possible, that men and women who were capable of sacrificing so much for a principle as they, could have been so densely ignorant and superstitious, but they were. While in one of her fits of insanity, in March, 1651, Mrs. Parsons killed her infant. This, of course, was taken as conclusive evidence that she was a witch. The poor demented creature confessed, that both she and hier husband were witches, indeed, she rather boasted of it. She was taken to Boston and although she was so seriously
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ill that it was feared she would die in prison before the orgies could begin, she was brought into court and tried, first : on a charge of bewitching the Moxon girls and then on the charge of killing her infant. Mrs. Parsons pleaded " not guilty " to the first charge and was acquitted; to the second she pleaded " guilty " and was condemned to be put to death immediately, but she was reprieved and as no further mention of the case is found in the records, she probably died. In the following year her husband was tried for witchcraft. The jury found him guilty, but the magistrates did not concur so the case was taken to the General Court, when the verdict was set aside and he was discharged.
William Pynchon's characteristics were strong and his son in- herited them, so, while Springfield sustained a great loss in the removal of the father, it still had his son, John Pynchon, who was an honorable son of an honored and loved father. John Pynchon, Elizur Holyoke and Deacon Samuel Chapin were ap- pointed by the General Court as commissioners, who should act as magistrates of Springfield. In 1658, the Court united them with the commissioners of Northampton and ordered that they hold court in each town annually.
On May 7, 1662, Hampshire County was organized, as an original county, not from portions of other counties. It covered a great territory including the present Counties of Berkshire, Hampden, Hampshire, Franklin and the towns in the western portion of Worcester County. In 1730, Worcester County was organized and Hampshire was reduced to the extent of the ter- ritory included in those towns. In 1761, Berkshire County was organized; in 1811, Franklin County was set off, and in 1812, Hampden County was also set off from old Hampshire County. When Hampshire County was organized in 1662, it contained but the three towns of Springfield, Northampton and Hadley.
A settled successor to the Rev. George Moxon was not obtained till 1661, when the son of the Hon. John Glover, of Dorchester, the Rev. Pealtiah Glover, became the minister of the Springfield Church. There had been preaching, however, by the Revs. Messrs. Horsford, Thompson and Hooker, for a few years, and in the years between 1652, and 1661, when they had no preach- ing, one or another of the principal men in the Church led the service. Mr. Glover was a man of cultivation who attracted and
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retained the affection and respect of his parishioners. His pas- torate ended with his death, in 1692, after thirty-one years of faithful service.
In the general trouble with the Indians in 1675, which is known as King Philip's War, Springfield suffered greatly. The Spring- field Indians, as they were called, had a permanent village and fort on an elevation known as Long Hill. They had lived peace- fully as neighbors of the English for so many years, that the set- tlers had no fear of them, nor did they suspect them of treachery. Possibly they would never have proved treacherous had their killing, scalping and burning instincts not been aroused by the advent of Philip's War.
On the night of October 3, and 4, 270 of Philip's warriors - according to the statement of a squaw - were quietly admitted to the Indian fort at Long Hill, by the Springfield Indians. The proposed destruction of Springfield was known by Toto, an In- dian who lived in the Walcott family, in Windsor, Connecticut, and he after much persuasion told all he knew about it. A messenger was immediately sent to Springfield from Windsor to warn the inhabitants. The people of Springfield fled to the home of Mr. Pynchon, which was fortified and strongly built of brick and stone, and to other fortified homes. No signs of any trouble from Indians were seen on October 4, the Springfield Indians going about as usual showing no evidence of excitement or enmity. This reassured the people, many of them returning to their homes. Mr. Glover, the minister, returned his books and other particular valuables to his home from the Pynchon house, where he had taken them. On the morning of October 5, it was determined to make an investigation. This dangerous work was undertaken by Lieutenant Thomas Cooper and Thomas Miller, both considerably past middle age. While approaching the fort they were fired upon and killed, but Lieutenant Cooper's great strength and vitality enabled him to retain his seat upon his horse till he reached one of the fortified houses, when he fell dead.
The Indians immediately began their attack. Three men and one woman were killed and many were wounded, one so ser- iously that he died later. The Indians burnt thirty-three houses and twenty-five barns, leaving but fifteen houses standing in the settlement, on the east side of the river. The Indians retreated
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before they had carried out their plans to the fullest extent. The old church escaped, but the jail and all the mills, besides the houses and barns, were destroyed. Many of the homeless ones contemplated going elsewhere, but the wiser ones, thinking that such a move would have a bad moral effect upon the neighbor- ing settlements, and might cause many of them to be abandoned, overruled the timid ones. As there were plenty of provisions for all, they decided to remain. At the time of the attack, Major Pynchon and Captain Appleton were in Hadley, whence they hurriedly returned as soon as word of the attack was received by them. The following winter, that of 1675 and '76, was mild and the people were well supplied with provisions, but they were in constant danger from Indians and considerable property was destroyed by them. At Longmeadow, no one attended church during the entire winter and a part of the spring. They decided to resume their attendance at worship on the last Sunday of March. On that day, at the brook called Pecowsic, they were fired upon and John Keep, one of the selectmen, his wife and their infant were killed and several were wounded. In the sum- mer, two or three other murders were committed by Indians in different parts of the town. After the death of Captain Turner, in the Falls fight, which occurred at what is now Turner's Falls, on May 19, 1676, the command of the English forces devolved upon Captain Samuel Holyoke, of Springfield, who personally reduced the number of the enemy by six, in the Falls fight.
The Pynchon mansion, to which many of the inhabitants fled on the night of October 3 and 4, was known as the Old Fort for generations till it was torn down in 1831. This house was the most substantial and expensive of its day, in western Massa- chusetts. It covered a ground space of forty-two feet on the front and was twenty-one feet deep. It was built of brick made by Francis Hacklinton, of Northampton (not of brick imported
from England or Holland as many persons used to say it was), 50,000 in all, in the year 1659. The foundations were of the red stone that has been common about Springfield and the neighbor- ing towns, ever since the first settlements were made. . Thomas Bascom and his son, of Windsor, were employed to get out these stone for the foundations, and to lay the kitchen floor, probably of stone, and the hearths for the fireplaces. Major
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Pynchon allowed the Bascoms seven shillings and sixpence for going to Springfield and returning to Windsor, and paid £17/15 for their work. Nearly all the other work was done by Edward Griswold, also of Windsor. He received for laying the stone and brick, f40. The timber, from which the luge frame and the boards were made, was cut on Major Pynchon's property. Corporal Rowland Thomas, one of the wood-choppers, was the man for whom Mount Tom was named. He was a " chummy " sort of man well liked by his neighbors and was familiarly called by them Corporal Tom. Samuel Buell and Timothy Teawle, two other men of Windsor, did the hewing of the trees after they were felled, and the sawing was done in the Major's own mill. The shingles cost something more than a pound by the thousand. They were made by Thomas Miller and John Matthews, and were eighteen inches long and an inch thick at the base. The shingling was done by Samuel Grant, still another man of .Windsor.
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