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REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01068 1051
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015
https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofle00cool
A BRIEF HISTORY
OF
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LEICESTER,
MASSACHUSETTS,
BY REV. A. H. COOLIDGE.
1890.
PHOTO-ELETTROTYPE.ENG.CO.NY-
First Congregational Church.
Town Hall.
Unitarian Church.
Leicester Academy.
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. 2 A brief history of Leicester, Massachusetts ... n.p.1890. 9.
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PREFACE. .-
The brief history of Leicester, contained in this volume, originally appeared in the " History of Worcester County," published in the spring of 1889, by J. W. Lewis & Co., of Philadelphia. It was written under the disadvantage of such stringent limitations of space and time as were prescribed by the publishers of that work. In consequence of urgent haste in issuing the vohunes, the time given for correction of proofs was altogether inadequate; and consequently some errors and misprints remained in the text, which would otherwise have been corrected. The whole sketch has now been carefully reviewed, some parts have been revised, and reprinted, and considerable additions have been made in an appendix.
In preparing the carlier history of the town, free use has been made of the " Historical Sketches of the Town of Leicester," and of the other historical researches of Governor Emory Washburn, as well as of Joseph A. Denny, Esq. To both of these gentlemen the town owes a debt of lasting gratitude for the preservation of facts, incidents, reminiscences and traditions, in which the town is peculiarly rich.
The writer has had access to the valuable revolutionary and other manuscripts in the possession of Miss Harriet E. Henshaw, to other documents and periodicals of the last century, and to historical vohunes and pamphlets published since the issue of Washburn's History ; and has thus been able to add something of interest even to the carly history of the town. The later facts of our local history have been gathered from many individuals and sources.
The endeavor throughout has been to present in a brief continuous narrative the scattered facts and incidents thus collected.
The ecclesiastical history, though condensed, will be found, it is believed, more complete and acenrate than any hitherto published. In this part of the work the writer has had the generons . and scholarly aid of the several clergymen and others, to whom credit is elsewhere given.
In that part of the work which relates to the Academy, and the public schools, free use has been made of the productions of Governor Washburn, Joseph A. Denny, Hon. W. W. Rice, Luther Wright and others, whose printed sketches are noticed in the body of the work. To this has been added a continnation of the history of the Academy, the schools, and the Public Library, to the present time.
The history of card mannfacture and the town of Leicester are to a large extent identical, and no apology is necessary for the prominence given to an industry which has contributed so largely to the welfare of the place. The periods of greatest prosperity in this business, were those of and following the wars of 1812 and 1861. By the aid of gentlemen in the business, or familiar with the story of its development, some valuable items have been added to the history of this interesting brauch of manufacture.
The history of our woolen manufacture, now much the largest business in town, has never before been written. Through the active interest and co-operation of gentlemen now, or formerly, counected with the several firms, detailed statements have been secured in relation to
4 F 30 Zu
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PREFACE.
the ten woolen mills in town, the annual products of which as shown from figures furnished by the different companies, amount to not far from $1,286,000.
No chapter of this history has been prepared with deeper interest, or more careful search and comparison of authorities, than that which relates to the part which Leicester and Leicester men bore in the Civil War. The aim has been to gather, before it should be too late, whatever facts relating to this subject could be gleaned from various sources; and, as far as could be ascertained, to place on record, and preserve for posterity, the name of every man who enlisted from, or for Leicester. After the lapse of a quarter of a century, it is probably impossible to make such a list complete. In the earlier years of the war, the assignment of enlisted men was confused ; and the lists and records both of the state and the town are incomplete. The results as secured in this history, have been attained only by careful and laborious examination, and comparison of town reports, the record of soldiers and officers in the military and naval service, lists of soldiers and families receiving state aid, enlistment papers, regimental and other histories, papers of the time, statements of soldiers and personal recollections. The private journal of Joseph A. Denny, Esq., kindly loaned by the family, has been especially serviceable. Not only the writer, but the public, are indebted to Capt: J. D. Cogswell and H. A. White, Esq., whose labors in rectifying the lists and records of soldiers, and obtaining facts, have been unremitting, and who have rendered important aid in the preparation of this part of the history. It is hoped that its publication will, by calling attention to the subject, lead to still further verification and amplification.
The work of gathering these materials, and setting them in order, for this history, has been a labor of love, only feebly expressive of appreciative gratitude to those whose patriotic devotion, sacrifices, heroism and sufferings contributed to the preservation of our union and our liberties.
The character and limits of the original sketch did not admit any endeavor to trace the geneologies of the several families in town, nor to dwell much upon the lives of individuals, except as they came in contact with affairs of public interest.
It should be understood that the writer is not in any way responsible for the selection of those whose portraits and sketches are found in the closing pages of the history. These were introduced by special arrangement of the publishers with the individuals themselves, or with their friends. They add to the value of the vohime, but there have been, and are other citizens `of the town who are worthy of similar notice.
In collecting the materials for this history, the writer has been dependent upon the generous aid of many individuals. He is especially indebted to Dr. Pliny Earle whose friendly assistance from the first, has been of invaluable service ; and whose direct communications add much to the interest of the record.
The work is now presented to the people of Leicester, as a small contribution to the history of a community which has, from the first, held an honorable position among the New England towns.
A. H. COOLIDGE.
LEICESTER, JANUARY 1, 1890.
£
THE
HISTORY OF LEICESTER.
BY REV. A. H. COOLIDGE.
1
LEICESTER.
CHAPTER. I.
SETTLEMENT.
Location-Indian Deed-Proprietors-Incorporation - Settlement-Hardships -Snow Storm-Thomas Green- Struggles-Rond Life-Houses-Mills -Lovell's War-Fortified Houses-Discouragements-Spencer " set off," also parts of Paxton and Auburn-Cyclone.
THE town of Leicester stands upon the ridge of the water-shed of Central Massachusetts, one thousand and seven feet above the sea level. Its waters flow east- erly, through Lynde and Kettle Brooks, into the Blackstone River; southerly, through French River, into the Quinebaug and Thames, and westerly from Shaw Pond, through the Chicopee River, into the Connecticut. Lynde Brook Reservoir, on the east, is one of the sources of water supply for Worcester, and Shaw Pond, on the west, is the source of the supply for Spencer. Leicester is about forty-eight miles from Boston. It is six miles west of Worcester and five hundred feet above that city. Its location is 42° 14' 49" north latitude, and 71º 54' 47" west longitude.
Its villages are the Centre, at first called Strawberry Hill; Cherry Valley, two miles east of the Centre, generally so-called since 1820; Rochdale, at first South Leicester, named Clappville, from Joshua Clapp, who purchased the mill property in 1829, and changed to Rochdale in November, 1869; Greenville, which about the middle of the present century began to be so called from its founder, Captain Samuel Green : Mannville, two miles north of the Centre, which was named after Mr. Billings Mann about the year 1856; and Lakeside, which has come to be so called within a few years. The northeast part of the town is called "Mulberry Grove," the name being first given in 1827 to the estate of Silas Earle, on which he raised mulberry trees and produced silk from the silk-worm.
At the time of its original purchase the township of Leicester was a part of the extended domain of the Nipmuek tribe of Indians. The character of this tribe had been greatly changed, and many of its members had been converted to Christianity through the labors of John Eliot and Daniel Gookin. Gookin, in his " Historical Collcetions," mentions seven " new pray - ing towns" among the Nipmuek Indians. One of these was in Oxford and another was Pacachoag, in Wor- cester and the southeastern border of Leicester. That the Indians of Leicester had been brought under the same influences is indicated by the fact that one of the
signers of the deed is styled " deaeon." Few Indian relies have been found here, there are few Indian tra- ditions, and there is little to indicate that the place ever had a considerable native population, although it was of sufficient importance to have a sachem.
The Massachusetts Colony, like the Plymouth, re- cognized the claim of the aborigines to the land, and secured it of them by fair purchase. The territory embracing Leicester, Spencer, a part of Paxton and a small portion of Auburn was bought of the Indians by nine gentlemen of Roxbury and vicinity, who be- came the original " Associate Proprietors." The sachem, Oraskaso, had recently died, and the deed is signed by his heirs. The price paid for the land was fifteen pounds, New England money.
The deed is an interesting historical document. It declares
That the heirs of Oraskaso, Sachem of a place called Towtaid, sitnato and lying near the new lown of the English, called Worcester, with all others which may, under them, belong unto the same place aforesaid, Towtaid, these heirs being two women, with their husbands, newly married; which, being by name called Philip Tray, with his wife, Momokhne; and John Wampkson, with Waiwaynom, his wife, for divers good canses and considerations ns thereunto moving ; and more especially for and in consideration of the sum of fifteen pounds, current money of New England to us in hand paid by Joshua Lamb, Na- thaniel Page, Andrew Gardner, Benjamin Gamblin, Benjamin Tucker, John Curtice, Richard Draper and Samuel Ruggles, with Ralf Brad- Imirst, of Roxbury, in the county of Suffolk, in New England, the re- ceipt of which we do fully acknowledge ourselves to be fully satisfied and paid, have given -- a certain tract of land containing, by estimation, eight miles square, sitnate, lying and being near Worcester aforesaid, abutting southerly, on the lands of Joseph Dudley, Esq., lately pur- chased of the Indians ; and westerly, the most southernmost corner of it little pond called Paupakquamcock, then to a hill called Wakapokotow- now, and from thence to a little hill called Mossonachud, and unto a great hill, called Aspomsok ; and so then easterly, upon a line, until it comes against Worcester bomids, and joins unto their bounds ; or how- soever otherwise abntted and bounded, &c.
In witness whereof, the said Philip Tray and Momokhne, and John Wampscon, Waiwaynow, being their wives, have herento set their hands and seals, this twenty-seventh day of January, anno Domini, one thousand six hundred and eighty-six.
Signed, sealed and delivered, in presence of us : PHILLIP TRAY X his mark. [Seal. ] MOMOKHUE TRAY ., her mark. [Seul } JOHN WAMSCON. [Seal. ] WAIWAYNOW WAMSCON X her mark. [Seal. ] WANDWOAMAG, X the deacon, his mark. [Seal. ] JONAS, his \ wife's mark. [Scal. ]
TOM TRAY X his mark.
NONAWANO X his maik. CAPT. MooGU's X bis mark.
ANDREW PITTEME X hls mark.
The deed was acknowledged before William Stough- ton, "one of his Majesty's Council, of his territory and dominions of New England," June 1, 1687.
Twenty-seven years afterward the number of proprie-
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LEICESTER.
tors was increased to twenty-two. They were men of wealth and influence, and some of them were owners of large traets of land in other towns of Central Massa- chusetts. None of them ever settled in Leicester. The purchase was a peeuniary investment, but was also designed to encourage the speedy settlement of the province.
The speculative venture was, however, for a long time unremunerative, and Towtaid remained for almost twenty-seven years an unbroken wilderness. The period was unpropitions for interior settlement, und it was well that none was undertaken. Leicester was thus saved from perils and horrors to which other towns were subjected, while her primeval forests waited in silence for more peaceful occupation. Under the influence of the Christian religion, the Nipmuck Indians had become a peaceable and friendly people; but upon the outbreak of King Phillip's War, they became divided and broken. That wily and powerful chief came among them, and by persuasions and threats, and by the force of his fiery eloquence, won a portion of them to his cause. Many of them remained true to their English neigh- bors; but others followed their great leader. Their savage instinets were reawakened, they took the war- path, and brought disaster and ruin to the scattered settlements. In this, and the successive French and Indian Wars, all the earlier settlements of Central Massachusetts were broken up. Worcester was twice attacked, and the colonists killed or driven ont. Lancaster was burned, and its people massacred. Brookfield suffered the same fate; and the interesting colony of Huguenots in Oxford, were attacked, and forced to abandon their homes, their vineyards, their church and the burial-place of their dead.
There was little encouragement in circumstances so adverse to seek homes on the bleak hills of Leicester, in the heart of the Indian territory.
After the close of the French war in 1713, measures were taken to make the grant available. The original deed was recorded March 8th, 1713-14. The title had been confirmed by the General Court, February 15th, with the usual conditions, that portions of the land should be reserved for the Gospel ministry, and for a school, and that within seven years fifty families should settle themselves, with reasonable provision for self-defence, on a part of the land. This was a virtual, and indeed is the only, act of incorporation of the town of Leicester.
The early English explorers found on Leicester hill a luxuriant growth of strawberries, and therefore gave the place the name of Strawberry Hill, which it had hitherto retained. It now received the name of Leicester, and was assigned to Middlesex County. It was on the 23d day of the same month that the number of proprietors was increased from nine to twenty-two. At this meeting the proprietors voted to offer one-half of the town to settlers, and ehose a committee, consisting of Colonel William
Dudley, Captain Joshua Lamb, Captain Thomas Howe and Captain Samuel Ruggles, to determine which half should be opened for settlement, and which should be reserved for later and more advantageous sale. They decided to offer for oeeupation the eastern half. On the 14th day of May the allotment was made; and the next day the committee came to Leicester to locate the lots. In June the township was, by order of the General Court, surveyed by Jolin Chandler, "to fix the bounds."
Fifty "house-lots," of from thirty to fifty aeres each, were laid out, and sold for one shilling an acre, with "after rights " of one hundred aeres for each ten acres of " house-lot." Thus the purchaser secured a farm of five hundred and fifty acres for fifty shillings. The lots were to be settled in three years or forfeited for the benefit of the public. One lot of forty acres was to be reserved for the ministry, one of one hundred acres for schools, and three lots of thirty acres each for mills.
Special grants were also made of seven and a half acres of "meadow," to each lot, for " feed." These meadows were evidently regarded as of special value ; but the event has proved that the hilly ridges and slopes are more productive. The cedar swamps were left undivided.
The lots were numbered, and the purchasers drew for choice. The first choice was drawn by John Stebbins. He chose the lot on Strawberry Hill, on which the house of Rev. Samuel May now stands. Here the first house in town was probably built.
At n meeting of the proprietors, held July 23, 1722 a committee of the proprietors was appointed to con- vey deeds to those who had complied with the terms of purchase. The deed itself was not, however, ex- ecuted till January 11, 1724, (O. S.), more than forty- seven years after the purchase of the town. It was recorded November 29, 1729,
The names of purchasers were John Stebbins, Joseph Stebbins, James Wilson, Samuel Green, Arthur Carey, Moses Stockbridge, Hezekiah Russ, John Peters, William Brown, Thomas Hopkins, Daniel Denny, John Smith, Ralph Earle, Nathanie, Kanney, Samuel Stimpson, Benjamin Woodbridge, John Lynde, Josiah Winslow, Josiah Langdon, Joshua Henshaw, Joseph Parsons, Nathaniel Rich- ardson, John Menzies, Joseph Sargent, Daniel Liver- more, James Southgate, Daniel Parker, William Brown, Thomas Baker, Richard Southgate, William Green, Samuel Prince, Dorothy Friar, Inomas Dexter, William Kean, James Winslow, Stephen Winehester, Paul Dudley, John King.
Thomas Baker and Joseph Parsons did not settle in Leicester.
These men and their families, and those who had already joined them, together with those who soon afterward united their fortunes with the infant colony, were the founders of Leicester. Some of them were men of superior quality. To the hardships and toils
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LEICESTER.
of these pioneer families, to their intellectual and moral character and their Christian fortitude, the town is largely indebted for its prosperity and its worthy standing and honorable history.
The settlement of the place began soon after the allotment was made. In a few instances the purchasers engaged families to hold the lots for them, but others took direet possession.
According to early traditions, the first inhabitants found upon their arrival a solitary hermit, named Arthur Carey, living on the hill which from him was named Carey's Hill. Whitney, in his County History, states that he " went thither and digged a cave in the side of this hill, and lived there as a hermit many years, while that part of the country was in its wilder. ness state," What were his feelings when his solitude was disturbed by the approach of civilization no one now can tell, nor what had been the romance or the tragedy of his life, nor why he had retired from the world and buried himself in the lonely forest.
Leicester was then an unbroken wilderness. Wor- cester was just beginning, for the third time, to be re- settled. There was no settlement of whites, except Brookfield, between Leicester and the Connecticut River. Bears and wolves and wild-cats and moose and other wild beasts roamed undisturbed in the forests, and the place was infested with serpents. The dams and curious homes of the beaver were long afterward visible in the meadows. There were, as late as 1740, pits for the capture of wolves; and the names "Moose Hill," " Raccoon Hill" and " Rattle- snake Hill" are suggestive of realities familiar to the early inhabitants, while " Bald Hill" stood peculiar as a tract of land which had been already cleared.
The first town-meeting of which there is any record was on March 6, 1721-22, although meetings had evi- dently been held for two or three years previously. A meeting-house had already been built. Judge John Menzes had served the town in the General Court the year before, and was re-elected the two succeeding years. He declined any remuneration for his services, "being fully satisfied and paid." The precedent thus established was so popular that when, in 1724, a snc- ecssor was to be elected, it was voted that whoever should be chosen "should be paid the same as Judge Menzes and no other." Lieutenant Thomas Newhall was then elected "to serve on the above conditions."
At the first recorded town-meeting Samnel Green was chosen moderator, first selectman, first assessor and grand juror. The town offices then were the same as those now filled at town-meeting. Two tithing- men were also elected to keep order in the meeting. house.
At first the families were sheltered in rude log- houses. The first impression which one of these honses made upon the mind of a little child is indica . tive of their outward aspect. Daniel Henshaw came to Leicester about thirty-four years after its first set- tlement to take possession of a house already built for
the family. The household goods had been moved from Boston on an ox-cart. As the family approached the house, by the narrow cart-path, the little danghter exclaimed "Oh, father, this is Leicester jail, isn't it?" In this household was a dog, named Hero, which came with the family from Boston. There was then no regular means of communication with the outside world, and Hero was for several years the mail-carrier of the family. Receiving verbal instructions as to his destination, he hastened at a rapid pace to Boston, with letters fastened to his neck, delivered them as directed, and after rest and refreshment returned with letters to the home friends.
In February and March of 1717, when there were only a few families here, and these were provided with hardly more than temporary shelters, the whole of New England was visited with a series of snow storms of almost unparalleled severity. For several weeks no mails could reach Boston, and when they came they were brought by men on snow-shoes. The low houses were covered so that in some cases the chim- neys could not be seen. Families for days were prison- ers in their own houses, and first made their exit from the attic windows. Many domestic animals perished, and some were said to have been rescued alive weeks afterward. After the storm ceased, cattle could be seen walking over drifts twelve feet deep, and feeding upon twigs on the tops of trees. Such was the welcome of these hills to the men and women who settled Lei- cester.
It was not far from this time that Dr. Thomas Green, then a boy of eighteen years, was left alone, in the summer, in charge of his father's cattle. Attacked with a fever, he sheltered himself under a shelving roek, by the stream on which his father's mill after- ward stood. Here, alone in the wilderness, his shrewd- ness saved him. He tied one of the calves within reach, and as the cow came to it, nourished himself with her milk. In this distressing condition he re- mained till found by passing land-owners, in the vicin- ity. They hastened on to inform his friends. His father at once came and removed him back to Mal- den, on horseback-a four days' journey.
The progress of the settlement for many years was slow. Its location was isolated, and the people, on their scattered farms, must have been lonely in the extreme. Expected and unexpected difficulties op- posed their prosperity. The soil was hard and cold, although in many parts rich and strong. They cut down the forests and cleared the fields, they were busy "breaking stubble," " ditching meddows," "split- ting ye hills," and making roads. They struggled with rocks, and winds, and snow, and suffered from cold, the degrees of which there were no thermometers to mark. Portions of the town were infested with rat- tlesnakes, and as now there were various enemies to vegetation. A bounty of "Six Pence pr. hed " was voted by the town " for killing Rattel Snakes." In one year, nearly a quarter of a century after the incor-
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LEICESTER.
poration of the town, Benjamin Richardson received eleven shillings as a bounty for killing twenty-eight rattlesnakes; and in 1740 the town paid in bounties forty-one pounds and three pence " for killing rattle- snakes, jays, red and gray squirrels, red-headed wood- peckers, and black birds," and even then there were "pits " for the capture of wolves.
The life of the town in the last century was primi- tive and rural. The cattle ran at large, and the office of " hog rieve" was no sinecure. In the town records are voluminous minutes of the special marks which each person adopted to distinguish his own cattle ; and of the horses, cows, hogs, "hiffers," " steares,". ete., which had "strayed " and were "taken up in damiag." The question annnally came up whether "horses might go at large, being fettered and elogged as the law directs," and whether "hoggs " should " go at large, yoked and ringed as the law directs."
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