USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Andover > Andover: symbol of New England; the evolution of a town > Part 12
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39
As one studies the complicated Frye family tree, it is often dif- ficult to distinguish one member from another, for the same giv- en names are repeated from one generation to another, and the recurrence of Johns and Samuels and Josephs becomes confus- ing. Even the professional genealogists fail to clarify their charts. The historian is bound to rejoice when he comes across an un- mistakable personality, like "Great John" Frye (1682-1753), who weighed over three hundred pounds when he died, or Judge Simon Frye (1737-1822), who served under Lord Jeffrey Am- herst in 1759 and was later a member of the General Court and of the governor's council, as well as chief justice of the Court of Common Pleas of Oxford, Maine.
The Frye name was perpetuated geographically in Andover through the descendants of Ensign Samuel Frye (1649-1725), third son of the patriarchal John. Samuel's son, Samuel (1694-
138
INDIANS-AND A FEW FRYES
1761), built in 1718 a saw- and gristmill on the west side of the Shawsheen River, on land deeded to him by his father. His son, Samuel (1719-1809), married Elizabeth Frye, his third cousin once removed, and established himself as his father's partner in what came to be known as Frye Village. Owning more than two thousand acres in various sections of the township, he was rated as its second wealthiest citizen. The description of him by his kinswoman, Ellen Frye Barker, is intriguing:
He was a very stern man and governed his house strictly, was me- dium size, light complexion, blue eyes, and light hair, worn very long in old age. This, with drab suit, silver knee and shoe buckles, cocked hat, and long staff, gave him a dignified appearance.
Surely here is an authentic personage, a gentleman of the old school, who might have been the model for Holmes's The Last Leaf:
They say that in his prime Ere the pruning-knife of Time Cut him down, Not a better man was found By the Crier on his round Through the town.
This Samuel Frye had nine children, one of whom, another Samuel (1769-1847), after spending some years in Hancock and Peterborough, New Hampshire, returned to Andover to care for the family interests. His son, Samuel (1791-1867), became a cord- wainer, or worker in cordovan leather; and this man's son, Sam- uel Charles (1822-1896), was a shoe merchant in Boston. With him the family name in that branch died out, but not until a Samuel Frye had been produced through six successive genera- tions. It may be noted parenthetically that in the Osgood family a John Osgood appeared for seven successive generations until one member failed in his biological duty and sired only daugh- ters, thus breaking the masculine continuity.
The most eminent of all the family, William Pierce Fry (1831-
139
ANDOVER: SYMBOL OF NEW ENGLAND
1911), unfortunately cannot be claimed as an Andoverian, for he was born in Lewiston, Maine. But although he dropped the final "e," he was the great-great-grandson of General Frye. Wil- liam P. Fry was for thirty years United States Senator from Maine, a valiant spokesman of the Republican Old Guard. General Frye and Senator Fry are the two descendants of John ffrie whose careers are recorded in the Dictionary of American Biography.
In all fairness, also, it should be confessed that the Fryes were strictly a North Parish family; but most of them were residents when Andover as a township included both sections. The his- torian of the South Parish cannot be criticized too much for claiming all the Fryes as Andoverians. The original homestead on Chestnut Street, built presumably by John ffrie, remained in the family until 1880, a period of more than two hundred years. An ancient elm, which, according to tradition Chaplain Frye planted in the spring of 1725 just before setting out with the Lovewell expedition, flourished and was not cut down until 1876.
This excursion into genetics would be unjustified, even irrele- vant and intolerable, if it were not that the Frye family is such an outstanding example of Puritan durability, versatility, and capacity for adjustment to new conditions. The Frye Genealogy, published in 1920, mentions 1,423 direct descendants of the original John ffrie, and many have since been added to the list. Since the turn of the twentieth century, however, not many have been residents in Andover; indeed the current telephone direc- tory lists only one Frye in Andover and one in North Andover. Individual members may be found in neighboring towns and cities, in other sections of the United States, and even in such far-off places as Mauritius and Canton.
This, then, is a short survey of the contribution made by one Andover family to American life. A similar, and equally profit- able study could be made of Abbots, Ballards, Chandlers, Fos- ters, Holts, Osgoods, Stevenses, and several others which fol-
140
INDIANS-AND A FEW FRYES
lowed a similar pattern. The earliest colonial ancestor was in each case of sound yeoman stock. Many of their descendants, of course, lived undramatic lives, earning their subsistence mainly from the soil, marrying into neighborhood families like their own, bringing up children to be independent and self-support- ing, and fulfilling cheerfully their duties as citizens, in war and peace. Very few were poor, and "black sheep" among them were rare. Some were comparatively obscure. Others, like General Frye and Senator Fry, stood out above the crowd. But together, whether followers or leaders, they created the town and the Com- monwealth which we know.
141
CHAPTER XII
Growth and Development
TT probably never occurred to Andoverians in 1746 that there was any reason for observing the centennial of their town. At the moment New England was recovering from the violent emotional impact of the "Great Awakening," the religious re- vival led by George Whitefield and other evangelists. In the campaign against Louisbourg, resulting in the capture of that French citadel in July, 1745, several young Andoverians had lost their lives through privation and disease. The minds of the citizens were undoubtedly on other matters than celebrations.
If a celebration had been held, the town fathers would prob- ably have reported progress. Their community had matured into a society very different from the primitive settlement of a hun- dred years before or even from the unstable community of witch- hunting days. James Truslow Adams felt that New England peo- ple sunk to their nadir intellectually and spiritually in the first quarter of the eighteenth century. A Massachusetts governor re- ported in 1723 that most of the deputies in the General Court were men "of small fortunes and meane Education." As a matter of fact, information is lacking about the Andover of that date, but it is probable that most of its citizens, although not illiterate, were inattentive to contemporary English thought and culture. They were not in touch with the polished London of the Augus- tan Era, ornamented by Swift and Addison and Pope. The en- tries in the town Records reveal a lamentable deficiency in stylis- tic grace and clarity as well as in plain ordinary spelling. The Boston News-Letter, founded in 1704, probably had few readers
142
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
beyond a few miles from Beacon Hill; and hardly any private libraries existed in Massachusetts before 1730.
Andover undoubtedly suffered from growing pains. But for practical chronological purposes it is possible to set apart the half century from the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 to the Peace of Paris in 1763 as a half century during which New England in many fields moved from adolescence to maturity, out of the Mid- dle Ages into modern times. It was a complex era, animated by forces often difficult to explain and trace but in the aggregate effecting many changes in the daily life and attitude of the av- erage citizen. Any one of us today could get along well with an Andoverian of the 1750's. I am not so sure about his ancestor of the 1650's. The fact that Parliament at the opening of 1752 had altered the calendar from Old Style to New Style was in a sense symbolic. A New Time had come in!
To the industrious and prudent members of the Andover community, as well as of the entire Colony, increasing prosperity brought with it the instruments of social maturity. Houses were better furnished and more comfortable. In well-to-do homes servants became more common and the routine of daily living was consequently less exacting. Books began to appear on the tables. Thought on all subjects, including religion as well as politics, was less inhibited. Nonconformity no longer resulted in ostracism.
At the opening of the eighteenth century, Andover, still re- covering from the witchcraft delusion, was provincial and in some respects primitive. The following years brought a mood of healthy discontent, of dissatisfaction with dullness, a desire to get in touch with the broader outside world. The town respond- ed less rapidly than Boston or Salem to the upsurge, but that it did respond seems clear. By 1750 it was as civilized as an English village of the type of Wantage or Amesbury, and without losing its vitality.
Fresh blood was coming in year by year to reinvigorate the old
143
ANDOVER: SYMBOL OF NEW ENGLAND
families. Of the Phillipses much will be said as this narrative continues. The Kittredges, particularly in the field of medicine, brought prestige to the North Parish. Of other new names sev- eral should be mentioned, printed here in alphabetical order: Adams, Chickering, Cole, Hardy, Jenkins, Kimball, Lewis, Marble, Martin, Noyes, Peabody, and Pearson. Not by any means did these newcomers displace the descendants of the founders-the Stevenses, Fryes, Fosters, Holts, and Abbots- but they did fit easily into the town's social life. No censuses were taken in those days, but it has been estimated that the total pop- ulation of Massachusetts, including Maine, was in 1700 about seventy thousand. The Andover of that date may have included seven hundred persons. By 1750, the town had at least two hun- dred households scattered over a considerable area. The first really accurate information dates from 1795, when we know that there were four hundred and one families within the limits of the town.
During that half century of expansion and intensification from 1713 to 1763, Andover was well aware of what was going on in colonial affairs. The proceedings of the British Parliament were topics of conversation in homes. It was the period of the final struggles between Great Britain and France for the domination of the North American continent. The so-called War of the Aus- trian Succession which broke out in 1744 was another of those peculiar and now virtually obsolete conflicts through which monarchs attempted to enlarge their boundaries and heighten their renown. It was obvious that England and France would be lined up on opposite sides and that the quarrels opened in Eu- rope would again have their repercussions in North America. One consequence was that bored young men could always find excitement in the wars. This is not a military history, but no one can write about those years without emphasizing the fact that in towns like Andover soldiers were constantly going and returning. Miss Bailey has carefully recorded the more thrilling
144
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
events as they affected local residents. Here I shall emphasize trends and movements rather than personal details.
As soon as war seemed imminent, Governor William Shirley, of Massachusetts, abetted by William Vaughan, conceived the "mad scheme" of a campaign against Louisbourg, the allegedly impregnable fortress which the French had constructed on the south side of Cape Breton Island, guarding the entrance to a deep and perfectly sheltered harbor. William Pepperrell, of Kit- tery, one of the wealthiest merchants in New England, was ap- pointed commander; and when volunteers were called for, the ranks were speedily filled with a motley miscellany of patriots and adventurers, most of them ignorant of even the rudiments of military discipline. Parkman has said, "Probably there was not an officer among them whose experience extended beyond a drill on muster day and the sham fight that closed the engage- ment." Among these were a large percentage of Andoverians, in- cluding James Stevens, who apparently commanded one of the companies.
On March 24, 1745, a fleet consisting of almost a hundred transports of various sizes, including many "small and malodor- ous vessels," set sail from Nantasket Roads, to the accompani- ment of prayers and bumpers of rum. Many of the potential heroes, when the tiny ships rolled about in the waves, were un- disguisedly and disgracefully seasick. Young men from Andover and other inland towns who knew nothing of tides and keels vowed that they would never again set out upon the deep.
Once landed, the attacking force of rather more than four thousand men faced tactical problems which their leaders had never before confronted, and much improvisation was neces- sary. They had to meet hardships which, with proper equip- ment and precautions, could easily have been avoided. Having brought too few tents, they were often obliged to sleep on the bare ground, soaked through with sea water and exposed to cold, foggy nights. Their cannon had to be dragged across a marsh on
145
ANDOVER: SYMBOL OF NEW ENGLAND
hastily constructed sledges of timber by soldiers wading up to their waists. Several of their larger cannon, overloaded by zeal- ous but incompetent gunners, burst and killed everybody in the near vicinity. War at its best is likely to be a succession of blun- ders, with victory going to the side making the fewer mistakes. In this campaign the colonials committed error after error, but their enterprise and persistence disconcerted their more lethar- gic adversaries.
The one serious reverse for the Americans was due entirely to carelessness and lack of discipline. Three hundred men under an officer named Brooks embarked on what was intended to be a surprise assault on the powerful island battery dominating the harbor. The landing was successfully accomplished in a high wind through heavy surf at midnight. It was not badly planned, but the participants, many of them noisily intoxicated, could not refrain from giving three cheers, thus announcing their arrival to the enemy. In view of the fact that they were undertaking a frontal attack on a strongly fortified position and had rashly dis- closed their whereabouts, it is not astonishing that they were re- pulsed with the loss of more than half their number.
Despite this reverse, the American batteries were rapidly pounding the walls and bastions into rubble, until not one house in the town of Louisbourg was left undamaged. So far had the morale of the garrison deteriorated that on June 15, just as the colonials were about to make a general assault, the citadel sur- rendered; and on June 16, Pepperrell and his men marched with drums beating through the south gate of the town.
The victory won, everybody wanted to get back home at once. The period of occupation was dull and monotonous; and sol- diers longed for their wives and sweethearts, as they have done after other wars on a grander scale. Whole companies demanded their discharge, and a group of them once actually threw down their arms to activate their protest. During the summer of 1745 infected wells brought on an epidemic of "putrid fevers and dysenteries" until, as one observer phrased it, "the people died
146
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
like rotten sheep." Parkman, referring to the burials in the ceme- tery outside the Maurepas Gate, says, "The forgotten bones of about five hundred New England men lie there to this day un- der the coarse neglected grass."
When winter descended, the sufferings of the soldiers became almost unendurable, as they faced, wearing inadequate clothing, weather conditions which made Essex County, Massachusetts, seem tropical. On May 10, 1746, Governor Shirley admitted that eight hundred and ninety deaths had occurred among the troops on Cape Breton. But spring did arrive, at long last, and the for- tunate survivors arrived in Boston, where the Reverend Mr. Prince, at the Old South Meeting House, preached them an elo- quent sermon entitled "Extraordinary Events the Doings of God and Marvellous in Pious Eyes." Most of his listeners were glad to leave the "extraordinary events" behind them and settle down for a few months of peaceful living.
Of the sixty Andoverians in the expeditionary forces, sixteen lost their lives. The only one killed was another member of the Frye family, Benjamin, who "was shot with a gun and died" --- no further details available! The others all perished from dis- ease, exposure, or privation. A typical entry was under date of January 4, 1746, "Benjamin, son of Christopher and Martha Carlton, died with sickness in the king's service at Lewisburg in the 20th year of his age." Among the other dead were sons of old families, Samuel Farnum, Isaac Abbot, Ephraim Barker, and two Chandlers, Jonathan and Isaac. James Frye, who as a young fellow in his thirties was at Louisbourg, later at Bunker Hill ral- lied his men, it was said, by shouting, "This day thirty years ago I was at the taking of Louisbourg, when it was surrendered to us; it was a fortunate day for America. We shall certainly beat the enemy." In 1775, the enemy was the Mother Country, which had been his ally in 1745.
The capture of Louisbourg, largely through colonial initiative and sacrifice, gave New England a new feeling of pride and uni- ty, thus helping to stimulate that cultural Renaissance to which
147
ANDOVER: SYMBOL OF NEW ENGLAND
we have already referred. It looked as if the mighty fortress were to be permanently under the British flag, guarding the approach to the St. Lawrence, a secure defense for Yankee fishermen. But governments, not peoples, controlled the conditions of settle- ment. By 1748 both sides were weary of the continuing conflict, with its enormous cost and obvious stalemate; and the rulers of Great Britain and France signed the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, agreeing that their respective conquests should be restored to the original holders. All New England was justifiably indignant. Her farmers and fishermen had provided most of the power for the subjugation of Louisbourg. Furthermore its capture was al- most the only accomplishment in the war to which the British ministry could point with any satisfaction. But French honor had been wounded by its evacuation, and Louis XV obstinately refused to make peace without its restoration. The colonists not only lost the fruits of victory but also retained a deep and last- ing resentment. The town of Andover, which in this instance had contributed more than its proportionate share, was left with unhappy memories. Suspicion of the British in New England was certainly much provoked by the return of Louisbourg to France.
In 1752, fifty-eight Andover citizens, who had either been on the expedition themselves or represented relatives who had died at Louisbourg, presented to the General Court a petition "pray- ing the grant of a Township out of the unappropriated Lands of the Province, under such Restrictions and Limitations as this Court shall order, for their services rendered." They were al- lotted a considerable area in York County, Maine, as a delayed war bonus, and several of them apparently took their families to settle there.
Some idea of Andover's position at the midcentury may be gathered from the Journals of the House of Representatives. In the session which opened on May 30, 1750, "Capt." Joseph Frye was the representative from Andover, and was also elected as one of the "Collectors or Tax-Gatherers on Tea, Coffee, Arrack, and on Coaches, Chariots, etc." for the County of Essex. No mention
148
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
is made of the number of Andoverians who possessed these in- teresting vehicles. Frye was appointed from time to time on other communities and was evidently much respected. At this session twenty-four towns, including Topsfield, Middleton, Me- thuen, and Woburn, were fined for "not sending a Representa- tive the present year." Of a total tax levy of 1000 pounds, Ando- ver's share was 12 pounds, 13 shillings, and 9 pence, exceeded in Essex County only by Newbury, Salem, Ipswich, Marblehead, and Gloucester, all coastal communities.
Captain Frye was busy not only representing his fellow citi- zens but also promoting his personal fortunes. On the minutes of the House is the following item:
A petition of Capt. Joseph Fry of Andover, setting forth that he had the command of a Company in the late War for the Defense of the Eastern Frontier, from the Month of March, 1748, to June, 1749; that for a considerable Part of the Time he was obliged to subsist himself and the said Company; for which he prays a reimbursement.
Frye must have had some influence with his legislative associ- ates, for later in the same session he was "allowed out of the public treasury seventy-three pounds eleven shillings and three pence, in full Consideration of his Expenses in the Petition mentioned."
Items of this kind were frequent in the deliberations of the General Court, and more were to follow. The struggle between Great Britain and France for the occupation of North America, interrupted temporarily by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, broke out again when Austria, France, and Russia attacked Frederick the Great of Prussia. In the campaigns which followed in Eu- rope, Frederick was assisted by British subsidies. This policy of- fered an excuse for the so-called French and Indian Wars in America. As a matter of fact, with the rivalry which existed, a decisive contest between France and England was inevitable.
In the spring of 1755 Governor Shirley commissioned John Winslow, of Marshfield, to raise two thousand volunteers for an
149
1
ANDOVER: SYMBOL OF NEW ENGLAND
attack on Beausejour, in Nova Scotia. The story of the ensuing campaign has been brilliantly told by Parkman in Chapter VIII of his Montcalm and Wolfe. The fleet set out from Boston on May 22, sailing up the Bay of Fundy and anchoring on June 1 only a few miles from the fort. Even before the British and colonials could move their heavy guns into position, the garrison surren- dered, leaving most of Acadia in the hands of the besiegers.
With Lieutenant-Colonel Winslow was the ubiquitous Jo- seph Frye, now promoted to be a major. Under specific orders he marched to one of the Acadian settlements named Chipody and burned most of the buildings. He then embarked most of his troops on board a vessel, leaving fifty men on shore at a place called Peticodiac, with instructions to set fire to the local church. What happened is described by Parkman as follows:
While thus engaged, they were set upon by three hundred Indians and Acadians, led by the partisan officer, Boishebert. More than half their number were killed, wounded, or taken. The rest ensconced themselves behind the neighboring dikes, and Frye, hastily landing with the rest of his men, engaged the assailants for three hours, but was forced to re-embark.
In spite of this temporary disaster, Winslow managed shortly to subdue all opposition in Nova Scotia. Then the British high command, with incredible stupidity and cruelty, decided to re- move the Acadians from their homes and country. Most of them were ignorant and unsophisticated peasants, devout members of the Roman Catholic Church and guided largely by their priests. Parkman wrote of them, "Two or more families often occupied the same house; and their way of life, though simple and virtu- ous, was by no means remarkable for cleanliness." In all, not far from six thousand men, women, and children were ruthlessly deported from Acadia and distributed among the colonies. Iron- ically enough, Andover, the home of Joseph Frye, received about thirty, most of whom belonged to the family of Germain Laun- dry, who is described as "an Infirm man and not capable of any
150
GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT
Labour." He did bring with him, however, not only a wife but also seven sons and thirteen daughters. The town fathers as- signed the Acadians "to three Distinck places, so that they might be constantly Imployed." Some of them, through the generosity of Jonathan Abbot, were allowed to occupy his vacant home- stead not far from what is now Sunset Rock Road, in the South Parish. Chief among these was Jaques Esbert, whose name was spelled in the Records, according to the accepted local pronunci- ation, as "Jockey Bear."
The presence of these foreigners was at first resented, but they soon appeared as law-abiding, frugal people, who needed both sympathy and practical assistance. Although they were Roman Catholics, they carried on their devotions unostentatiously and won admiration for their piety. Soon their neighbors were sup- plying the exiles with tools and supplies, and in the spring of 1756 the fields around them were blue with flax, which they had planted and would soon pull and weave. The selectmen provid- ed provisions, including "pork, beef, Indian meal, pease, beans, sider, etc.," and also paid for the attendance of Dr. Abiel Abbot and for the medicines which he prescribed when they fell ill.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.