USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynnfield > The beginnings of Reading and Lynnfield, Massachusetts > Part 1
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Gc 974.402 R22ho 1527716
M. L
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 00082 9470
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019
https://archive.org/details/beginningsofread00howa
The Beginning of Reading and Lynnfield C
Massachusetts
--
Loea Parker Howard
1937
1527716
Pages from the Old Town Book of Lynn
These lands following were given to the inhabitants of the Towne of Lynn Anno Domini 1638:
* To ye right hon ye Lord Brooks, 800 acres as it is estimated.
* To Mr. Tho: Willis, upland and medow, 500 acres as it is esti- mated.
* Mr. Edwa: Holliocke, upland and medow, 500 acres.
* Henry Collins, upland and medow, 800 acres and tenn.
Mr. Flood, upland and medow, 60 acres and tenn.
Edw: and Frans' Ingalls, upland and medow, 120 acres.
* Widdow Bancroft, 100 acres.
* Widdow Hammon, 60 acres.
* George Burrall, 200 acres. John Wood, 100 acres.
* Tho: Talmage, 200 acres and tenn.
* Nicholas Browne, 200 acres and tenn.
Thomas Laughton, 60 acres and tenn.
John Cooper, 200 acres and tenn.
* Boniface Burton, 60 acres.
* Mr. Sadler, 200 acres and the rock by his house.
* Joseph Armitage, 60 acres.
* Godfrey Armitage, 20 acres.
Mathew West, upland and medow, 30 acres and tenn.
George Farr, 30 acres and tenn.
* James Bowtwell, 60 acres.
* Zachary Fitch, 30 acres and tenn. Jarrett Spencer, 30 acres.
Jenkin Davis, 30 acres and tenn.
* George Taylor, 30 acres and tenn. - Thorne, 30 acres and tenn.
* Thos: Townsend, 60 acres.
* Tho: Parker, 30 acres and tenn. Francis Lightfoot, 30 acres and tenn.
Richard Johnson, 30 acres and tenn.
Robert Parson, 30 acres and tenn. To Philip Kirtland, junior, 10 acres.
Goodman Croste, 10 acres.
* Hugh Burt, 60 acres.
- Wathin, 10 acres.
Richard Brooks, 10 acres.
Francis Godson, 30 acres.
George Wellbye -
Will: Partridge, upland, 10 acres.
William Cowdrye, 60 acres and tenn.
Allin Bread, 200 acres.
Edward How, 200 acres and tenn.
* John Poole, 200 acres. Job Seyers, 60 acres.
Thos: Seyers, 60 acres.
Thos: Chadwell, 60 acres.
* Christopher Foster, 60 acres.
* Edmund Farrington, 200 acres. Nicholas Potter, 60 acres.
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* - Walton, 60 acres. William Ballard, 60 acres. Josiah Stanborough, 100 acres.
* Edwa: Tomlins 200 acres and twenty.
* Will: Knight, 60 acres. - South, 100 acres. -
* John Smith, 60 acres.
* Mr. Edward Howell, 500 acres.
* Nicholas Battye, 60 acres.
* Edward Burcham, 30 acres and tenn.
* Anthonye Newill, 30 acres.
* Tho: Newill, 30 acres and tenn. Michael Spenser, 30 acres.
* Timothy Tomlins, 80 acres. William Harker, 20 acres.
* Richard Rooton, 60 acres, sould to ye Towne 20 acres next to ye towne for 3 shillings.
Nathaniel Handford, 20 acres.
Thomas Hudson, 60 acres. Thomas Halsye, 100 acres.
* Samuel Bennitt, 20 acres. John Elderkin, 20 acres.
* Abraham Belknap, 40 acres. Robert Driver, 20 acres. John Deakin, 10 acres.
* Philip Kirtland, senior, 10 acres.
* Tho: Marshall, 30 acres and tenn. Nathaniel Whiterige, 10 acres. George Fraile, 10 acres.
Joseph Rednap, 40 acres.
* Edward Bridges, 10 acres.
Richard Langlye, 40 acres. Tho: Talmadge, junior, 20 acres. Tho: Couldum, 60 acres.
* Adam Hawks, upland, 100 acres.
* Thomas Dexter, 350 acres. Daniel How, upland and medow, 60 acres.
* Richard Walker, upland and
medow, 200 acres.
Henry Gaines, 40 acres. Richard Wells, 10 acres.
- Pell, 10 acres.
John White, 20 acres.
Edward Baker, 40 acres.
James Axey, 40 acres.
Will: Edmonds, 10 acres.
Edward Ireson, 10 acres.
Jeremy How, 20 acres.
William George, 20 acres.
Ephraim Howe, next to ye land of his father, upland, 10 acres.
- Ivorye, 10 acres.
Timothy Cooper, 10 acres.
Sam'll Hutchinson, 10 by estima- tion.
Mr. Samuell Whiting, the pastor, 200 acres.
Mr. Thomas Cobit, the Teacher, 200 acres.
The above represents three pages from the Towne booke of the Records of
Lynn the 10th 1 Ano Domni 59
mo
60 -By me Andrew Mansfield towne Recorder
Notes: By the calendar then in use the Ist month was April. The * indicates grantees mentioned in the following pages.
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The Six Mile Grant and Its Distribution
Recent search among the old records of the Quarterly Court of Essex County in Salem, has thrown much light upon the planting of Linn Village and Linn Fields. One document is a copy of three pages from the long lost town book of Lynn, giving the number of acres granted in 1638 to each of its inhabitants, in the distribution of thirteen square miles of land, most of it lying within the present bounds of Wakefield, Reading and Lynnfield.
This grant was from the General Court of the Colony, and extended six miles from the meeting-house in Lynn. Its western limits were the two Wakefield ponds, and from thence north to the Ipswich River. The date was March 13, 1638. The distribution began immediately, for according to the book of Lands and Ways of the Town of Reading, Nicholas Browne received 200 acres, much of it on the east shore of the Greate Pond, on March 18, 1638.
One of these grantees received 800 acres-11/4 square miles; several, 500 acres; fourteen, 200 acres; seven, 100 acres; and forty-eight had either 40, 60, or 80 acres. This allotment was not based upon their relative am- ount of property as in later division of common lands. When the Colony made these large grants to various towns between 1630 and 1640, it had several objects in view:
Promises Were Fulfilled
These land grants enabled the company that promoted the settlement of Massachusetts Bay to fulfil its obligation to the patriotic stockholders who had advanced money to meet the cost of fitting out and of planning the Colony .. Its pledge was as follows:
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"The allotment of land to adventurers in the common stock was 200 acres for each £50 adventured. For persons as go over at their own charge and are adventurers in the common stock shall have lands for themselves and their families at the rate of 50 acres for each person; but being 'noe adventurers' shall have 50 acres for the Mister and familie."
This contract explains the thousands of acres in Concord and elsewhere granted to Gov. Winthrop and Gov. Dudley; the great farm of Gov. Bell- ingham in Andover; of Hon. John Humphrey, which extended for a mile in every direction from Suntaug Lake, Lynnfield; and, in this Lynn dis- tribution of 1638, Lord Brook's farm of 800 acres, Mr. Willis', Mr. Holy- oke's, and Mr. Howell's, of 500 acres each, besides a dozen more of 200 acres. Among the last group were Nicholas Brown whose lands east of the Greate Pond included the present Beebe estate; John Pool, the town miller, whose farm extended the entire length of the present Bay State Road, including in its limits the Wakefield and Cox farms and Camp Curtis Guild; Richard Walker, the first captain of the Reading military company, and its first representative to the General Court; Richard Sadler, the town clerk of Lynn, whose land west of Haverhill street, between the Ipswich River and Bare Meadow, is still known as Sadler's Neck. Grantees such as these, had advanced money to aid in planting the Colony, and now re- ceived this land in payment.
Those who were granted 40, 60, or 80 acres came over at their own charge, and had advanced no money to the company. Among these is the name of William Cowdrey, 60 acres. He was town clerk, selectman, and a deacon of the church during the first forty years of the town's existence; John Smith, 60 acres. He later owned by purchase or inheritance the Howell farm of 500 acres, extending east from the lake at Wakefield Junc- tion to the Saugus line; Zachary Fitch, 40 acres, on Fitch's Lane, now Salem street, Wakefield, a short distance from the Common. He was chosen as a selectman and a deacon when the town and the church were organized; Thomas Parker, 40 acres. His homestead was about fifty rods
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north-east of the present town hall in Wakefield; was "won of the founda- tion of the church," and the ancestor of Capt. John of Lexington fame, and Rev. Theodore, the theologian and anti-slavery agitator; "Widdow Ban- croft," 100 acres, probably near Beaver Dam, Lynnfield Center. Her hus- band, John, died in 1637, a few years after their arrival at Lynn. He was not the father, but probably a brother of Lieut. Thomas, ancestor of the Reading Bancrofts and of George Bancroft, the historian; George Tay- lor, 40 acres, described as "now situated in the town of Reading." In 1642 he sold this and 50 acres more, all east of the Greate Pond, to Nicholas Brown; Adam Hawks, 100 acres, west of the Saugus line. In 1653, when a committee settled the boundary between Lynn and Lynn Village, this farm was mentioned as John Smith's farm; Joseph Armitage 60 acres; his brother Godfrey, 20 acres; Hugh Burt 60 acres; all located in Lynn Vil- lage, and sold by them soon after 1638; Thomas Marshall, 40 acres. Thirty acres of this were near John Pool's saw mill on the Cox farm. His dwell- ing with 16 acres adjoining was near the corn-mill, where John Pool and Thomas Parker were his neighbors. He was one of the first selectmen; he with William Cowdrey, John Pool and Richard Walker were foremost in promoting the settlement of Lynn Village. He went to England, fought under Cromwell, returned to Lynn, where he was for many years landlord of the famous Anchor Tavern, half way between Boston and Salem. Like Walker, he was a captain and a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company.
Longley vs. Town of Lynn
The occasion which led to the copying of these three pages of the old Lynn town book was a suit brought against that town in 1660 by Wil- liam Longley, "for withholding and not laying out forty acres of land which were his due and equal proportion as an inhabitant, according to a distribution made in 1638." He won his suit, and forty acres were laid out for him west of the Humphrey farm in Lynnfield. In 1678, it was pur- chased by Lieut. Thomas Bancroft. During the trial of this case, Joseph Armitage testified "that in the division of land, he and his brother Godfrey
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had given to them four score acres. He sold it about twenty-one years before for £15 gold. The 30 and 40 acre lots in Lin village were worth and sold for 20 shillings per acre." Andrew Mansfield and Hugh Burt testified "that the 30 and 40 acre lots in Lin village which were given by the town of Lin at the same time that the forty acres now in question were given were worth in their judgment about 20 shillings per acre."
In the inventory of the estate of Abraham Belknap of Lynn taken in 1643, is a "lot of 30 acres in the Village." He was granted 40 acres in the distribution of 1638. This evidence, and many other facts already stated, prove that Lynn Village was laid out in adjacent 30 and 40 acre lots along Main Street, from the head of the Pond south to the Town Hall. Inland Villages Planted
This brings us to the consideration of the second object sought by the General Court when making grants to towns, namely, the planting of villages on the frontier inland from the Bay. This is clearly shown in the wording of the two Lynn grants which immediately became territory of Linn Village. On March 13, 1638/9, when Linn was granted six miles into the country, two men were appointed "to report whether the land beyond it may be fit for another plantation." This six mile grant was at once divided among the one hundred inhabitants of Lynn as set forth in the preceding pages. Three months later there was a second grant viz, "The petition of the inhabitants of Linn for a place for an inland plantation at the head of their bounds is granted them four miles square on condition they shall within two years make some good proceeding in planting so as it may be a village fit to contain a convenient number of inhabitants which may in due time have a church there."
This second grant extended west to Woburn bounds and included most of the present town of Reading and all of Wakefield west of its two ponds. Inhabitants of Lynn, as such, had no share in any distribution of this grant. It was reserved for future inhabitants of the new plantation.
On Nov. 4, a committee was appointed "to measure the bounds of
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Linn and to certify how it lyeth for the settling of their bounds and the bounds of the village." This committee in the following June "That the six mile grant from the meeting-house in Linn extends from the Charles- town bounds (Stoneham) to the south end of the Greate Pond at Linn vil- lage from thence to the greate swamp adjoining to the Greate Pond, and so to run northward to the North River (Ipswich) and thence to Salem bounds (Middleton.)
The fact that in November 1639, a village is spoken of, and that in June 1640, it is called Linn village, indicates that probably rude habita- tion had been built; but it was not until 1644, when a sufficient number of families had been settled, that the Court christened the village by ordering, "that Linn village shall be called Redding at the request of its inhabitants."
Many such villages were planted during the decade between 1635 and 1645, all with conditions similar to those governing the settlement of Linn village. Charlestown was defined as extending eight miles from its meeting-house and its proprietors were granted two miles at its headline provided they build within two years. Later it was given a grant of four miles square "to make a village." Previous to 1638 it was known as Charlestown village and then Woburn.
Cambridge was granted land for Shawsheen village, now Billerica, "provided they make it a village to have ten families within three years." It was laid out in farms of 125 acres, and village lots of 40 acres near to the church.
Topsfield was settled by the inhabitants of Salem who "agreed to plant a village near the river which runs down to Ipswich."
A Typical New England Village
Many other settlements were planted by order of the Court under similar conditions, viz, a considerable number of homestead lots, centrally located and large farms often owned by the villagers sometimes two or three miles distant.
Each village had its church, with a "learned minister," settled for life; a school; a military company and a training field or common. At
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first all dwellings were required to be within half a mile of the meeting- house, and no man could become a resident unless he had purchased a "homestall." These requirements insured safety, promoted neighborliness, established certain uniformity in social customs and habits.
Land was held by titles independent of any foreign prince or land- lord, and local government was secured by freemen in town-meetings as- sembled. Each village became a small democracy.
When a town was taking shape time, correspondence and long con- sultations were necessary to secure suitable families.
All this was true in the founding of Reading. William Cowdrey its town clerk for forty years and one of the first deacons and a selectman testified in 1683, when about eighty-one years of age that, "I Being one of the first Beginers of ye towne of Reding and before ye settlement of sayd town we, the proprietors of land in Redding had many meetings at Lyn." This explains why, although the land was granted in 1638/9, a church was not organized in Linn village until 1645, nor deacons or selectmen chosen until 1647.
The Puritan fathers were not so much interested in promoting their real estate, as in securing a firm foundation for their great experiment in self-government here in New England. They builded wisely and deliber- ately. The institutions thus established have been equal to the tests placed upon them, and have become the main stay of our strength as a nation.
Old Reading was thus founded; and, during the three hundred years of its history, has been true to these ideals. It has experienced peace and war; periods of prosperity and adversity. It has never failed to bear its share of responsibility in maintaining a worthy democracy.
Promotors of the new village were Lynn men; but many leading settlers came from other towns.
The statement often made that Reading territory was a part of Lynn, and that its early settlers were chiefly from that place, convey an erroneous impression. The two land grants of 1638/9, now Wakefield and
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Reading, were intended for a new village. Before 1638, this was common land of the Bay Colony, and not a part of Lynn territory.
Its early settlers were far from being exclusively inhabitants of Lynn. The Rev. Henry Green, the first Reading minister, settled in 1645, was from Watertown, and a large group of most influential settlers soon migrated from Watertown and Dedham. Such were Jonas and William Eaton, John Batchelder, John Damon, Isaac Hart, Thomas Taylor, Henry Felch; Thomas Bancroft and Robert Gowing leased land in Reading, joined its church, and later moved to neighboring farms in Lynnfield.
From Charlestown came Thomas Kendall, Francis Smith, Peter Pal- frey and Jeremiah Swayne. Robert Burnap was from Roxbury via Salem. Four of the seven first selectmen were from this group while Kendall, Ban- croft and Damon were of the first eight deacons. All but two of those mentioned shared in the first distribution of the Reading common lands made in 1647. Their homesteads were on village lots sold to them by Lynn grantees of 1638, who did not wish to improve their holdings. They were men of character, ability and property; attracted to Reading, doubt- less, by the prospect of sharing in the four mile grant (16 sq. miles) made to Lynn village in 1638.
Full credit should be given, however, to those far-sighted inhabitants of Lynn who for years had promoted the planting of the village by se- curing grants from the General Court, selecting a few families to venture into the wilderness, securing the wise and devoted minister from Water- town, and inducing such a superior group of families to follow him to Reading.
County and town records show that the Lynn men to whom credit, as founders and promoters of Lynn village chiefly belongs were Dea. Wil- liam Cowdrey, Capt. Richard Walker, John Pool, Nicholas Brown, Lieut. William Marshall and Dea. Thomas Parker.
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The Ancient Records of Lynn and Reading
During three hundred years many things have happened to the old records of Lynn and Reading. At the outset there were only a handful of voters, the town meetings were very informal, and the records were probably kept on loose leaves that were soon misplaced and torn. By 1715, the Lynn records were "so much shattered" that its inhabitants voted, "that the oldest book may be kept fare to reed severell years, and the second book transcribed." A few pages were thus copied and the books afterwards lost or destroyed. It is quite likely that the pages copied out of the old book in 1660, which are printed at the beginning of this study, giving the names of the grantees in the distribution of the six mile grant in 1638, were among its most important ones. The first record book of Reading also became "shattered," and at a town meeting in 1681 it was voted, "that the Old Town Book be transcribed that is in all material things." This was carefully done probably under the supervision of the venerable William Cowdrey deeply interested in promoting Lynn Village years before its actual settlement, and with his son, Nathaniel, its town clerks until 1688. It is in two parts, one containing records, of town meet- ings from 1644, and the other the Book of Lands and Ways beginning in 1638. Besides records copied in 1681 it has also a few mutilated entries of the very earliest land records. Many grants mentioned in the Court copy of Lynn grants of 1638 are confirmed and fully described in the Reading book of Lands and Ways. It has the following title: "A Trew Record of the lands and medows within the Bounds of the towne of Redding as they were given by the Towne of Lin or as they were given by the Towne of Redding or as they have been purchased of others.
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The 18th of the 12 mo. 1638."
In a few instances the copy of 1681 gives neighboring owners as of that year. For example, Nicholas Brown bought land east of the Greate Pond of George Taylor of Lynn in 1642, and Hananiah Parker is men- tioned as owning land on the north; he was in 1642 only four years of age, having been born in 1638!
The copy of 1681 was again transcribed by William Wightman, town clerk of Reading from 1862 to 1874. The ancient letter forms were diffi- cult to decipher, making his task long and perplexing. His copy was beau- tifully done and remarkably accurate. Before 1700 the title "Master" was a very honorable one, reserved for ministers, magistrates, and other learned men. Mr. Wightman sometimes mistook the abbreviation "Mas." for that of "Maj.", as result he gave to several of the early ministers the military title of major. Jeremiah Swayne was the only Reading man bearing the title of major before 1700.
In addition to the Book of Lands and Ways of Reading, the Registry of Deeds in Salem, contains records of the transfer of various lots that were parts of the six mile grant of 1638. Some of these lots were in Lynn Village, some in Lynn Fields and some in Saugus.
Land in this wilderness, three centuries ago, had so little value that many grantees did not pay the cost of having it located; others neglected to have its transfer recorded; and the crude way in which these remote tracts were laid out make it impossible to locate all of these early grants. No compass or chain was used; at the ends of boundary lines, trees were marked with initials of owners; only natural features were mentioned as boundaries, such as ponds, rivers, swamps and ledges; often the name of an adjacent owner or a highway is mentioned.
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Three Large Grants South of the Ipswich
The first and largest of the one hundred grants made in 1638 was to the Rt. Hon. Lord Brooks. It was 800 acres (11/4 sq. miles), not far from the present village of North Reading. It was bounded on the north by the Ipswich river, south by Bare meadow, west by Haverhill st. and included land on both sides of Chestnut st. for a mile. The General Court in 1639 "empowered Edward Holyoke to manage the estate of his lordship until the Lord Brooke do otherwise dispose of it." In 1654, Robert Bridges, probably acting as an attorney for the town of Lynn, sold this farm to Robert Burnapp of Reading. This deed was witnessed by Thomas Mar- shall and John Cotton before Deputy Governor Billingham. (Essex, Vol. 4, page 534). Payment was to be in good, sweet, well-conditioned, fat, fresh beef and in good, sweet, dry, well-cleansed, merchantable wheat at the warehouse of Mr. Broughton, Boston.
In 1662, Robert Burnapp sold the Lord Brooks farm to Capt. George Curwin of Salem for £200. Its western end was described as being on the farm of Capt. Walker (the Sadler grant), and the eastern end by Willis' meddow, "where a small brook runs out of the meddow down (north) towards the greate river." The meadow and brook still bear his name. Grant to Mr. Sadler
West of the Lord Brooks farm, was a grant of 200 acres made to Mr. Richard Sadler. It was south of the Ipswich, north of Bare meadow, and west of Haverhill st. This and a part of the Lord Brooks farm are still known as Sadler's Neck. He returned to England in 1646. The town of Reading bought the west half and afterwards gave it to the eight families
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then living in the North Precinct. Several of these families later sold their lots to Francis Nurse of Danvers, a grandson of the good Rebecca Towne who was executed for witchcraft. Capt. Richard Walker bought the half next to the Lord Brooks farm, and in 1680 sold it to John Legg of Marble- head "with seven acres of meadow, south of a river commonly called Bare river."
The Reading book of Lands and Ways has the following record: "Land of Capt. Richard Walker that he bought of Lieut. Thomas Marshall, which is one-half of the 200 acres that was sometime Mas. Richard Sad- ler's, lying west of the farm that was Capt. Bridges" (the Lord Brooks grant).
Grant to Mr. Willis
A third grant south of the Ipswich, was that of Mr. Thomas Willis, 500 acres of upland and meadow. It extended east from Willis' Brook to the paper mills in Middleton (then Salem territory). The present Saga- more Golf Course was within its limits. His grant was sold to Isaac Hart by his daughter Elizabeth, wife of the Rev. John Knowles of Watertown. These three large grants extended for three miles along the south bank of the Ipswich, from the junction of the present Park and Chestnut streets in North Reading east to the paper mills on the Middleton line.
Persons Connected With These Grants
Robert Lord Brooke was born in 1607; educated at Cambridge; was an M. P. for Warwick town in 1628 when he succeeded his cousin in the peerage. He early imbibed republican notions and with young Vicount Say and Sele refused to profess loyalty to the King in 1639. He was a captain in the armies of the Commonwealth in 1642. He died March 2, 1642/3, in his thirty-sixth year at Lichfield, being struck in the vizor of his helmet by a musket ball while directing the seige of St. Chad Cathed- ral. (See p. 333, Vol. II, Complete Peerage, by Gibbs.)
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