USA > Massachusetts > Barnstable County > Cape Cod, the right arm of Massachusetts : an historical narrative > Part 4
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The town received some little attention, however, from the court in its initial period. It was forbidden that any one should purchase two house-lots or more and have them
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together and maintain but one house upon them. This was intended to make the settlement compaet, as a matter of safety and precaution. The townsmen were permitted to keep their swine unringed, they keeping them with a herdsman, "until complaint be made of some hurt they had done;" and the constable was ordered to ereet a pair of stocks and a pound. By the close of 1640 some twenty-five families were established there. As Mr. Matthews was one of the first comers, it seems most probable that the establishment of the church was coeval with the settlement of the town.
The founders of Yarmouth were men of such stability of character and in such close sympathy with the authorities of Plymouth, that they were able to sustain themselves in the face of all disadvantages. The three grantees, Anthony Thacher, John Crow* and Thomas Howes, were men of solid and substantial character. Mr. Thacher had been a eurate of the parish of St. Edmunds, Salisbury, had suffered shipwreck in the storm of 1635, already adverted to, had settled first in Newbury, then in Marblehead, whence he came to Yarmouth. Mr. Crow is believed to have been of that branch of the family which removed from Kent county to Wales, and came to this place from Charlestown. Mr. Howes came over in 1635, when he was in Salem. The family was an ancient and honorable one in Norfolk county, England. From these men, and Mr. Andrew Hallet, James Matthews, Samuel Rider, Richard Sears, Edmund Hawes and Francis Baker, a large proportion of the present inhabitants are doseended.
The earlier years of the settlement of the town were distracted by the two prolific sources of trouble ineident to
*This name soon after began to be written Crowe, and about the third generation, Crowell .- History of Old Yarmouth.
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New England settlements-theological controversies and disputes about land titles. Which was the cause of the greater degree of discussion it is difficult to decide, but both combined served to embroil the settlement for the first ten years of its existence. The land question was the first settled. Thacher, Crow and Howes, the three grantees, were at the outset appointed by the court to be the land committee, and under instructions to "make an equal division to each man, according to his estate and quality." This was a hard task for any three men. Each person's estate could easily be settled ; but his quality, the value of the service he had rendered or was likely to render, was so open to different constructions, that could they agree upon it, those for whom they acted could hardly be expected to acquiesce in their estimate. The malcontents appealed to the court, which thereupon added to the committee four townsmen, Messrs. Nicholas Simpkins, Wn. Palmer, Philip Tabor and Joshua Barnes. The enlarged committee still failed to give satisfaction, whereupon Capt. Miles Standish was called upon, and invested with full powers. The
captain displayed in this emergency the same decision and energy which he had evinced in his military career. In May, 1648, having previously heard a great number of cases, he announced his decision. Some parties were ejected from lands they had occupied; many of the former grants of uplands and meadows were abrogated, and the grants reverted to the town, and in some cases exchanges were made. Standish's anthority being absolute, no remon- strance was accepted, and his award became at once operative. For the future, the court ordered that "Mr. Starr, Win. Nickerson and Robert Dennis be added to the committee of the town for the present year, and thenceforth that each year the town choose a committee of three, without
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whose consent, or that of the remainder of them, no grants of meadows or uplands should be made," but in case the future differences should become irreconcilable, they " should repair to Capt. Standish for instructions." Whether well or ill-considered, this action was a final settlement of the controversy which had so long and so unhappily divided the settlers in the early years of the town.
The theological troubles of the people were not so easily or summarily composed. The settlement had hardly com- menced before difficulties sprang up in the church. Mr. Marmaduke Matthews, an educated and witty Welshman, but endowed with an indiscretion and latitude of speech which constantly subjected him to suspicion, was the first minister, and from the beginning he was antagonized to a considerable portion of the church, on grounds which it is difficult at this length of time to fully comprehend. He early had a controversy with William Chase, in which the latter temporarily lost the favor of the majority, was superseded by another in the office of constable, and came near being forced to leave the town. Next we hear of Thomas Starr, Hugh Tilley, Joshua Barnes and William Nickerson being complained of by Mr. Matthews's partisans as "scoffers and jecrers at religion and making disorders at town meeting;" but they were subsequently acquitted by the court. The opposition to Mr. Matthews then resulted in the attempt to form another church and society in town. Rev. Joseph Hull, who had exercised the office of minister in Barnstable, before the advent of Mr. Lothrop, and who had been virtually deposed by him, was invited to preach in Yarmouth by those dissatisfied with the ministrations of Mr. Matthews. Mr. Hull complied, but the unfriendly inter- ference of the Barnstable church, defeated the arrangement. The opposition to Mr. Matthews was by no means abated
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"by this intercession, and after a checkered and turbulent ministry of half a dozen years, he was compelled to relinquish his charge, probably about the year 1646.
Mr. Matthews's successor was Rev. John Miller, who in 1649 became the minister of a people who had not as yet healed the differences which had so long divided them. Mr. Miller was educated for the ministry at Cambridge, England, had resided at Roxbury and Rowley, and was one of the seventy-seven mentioned by Cotton Mather, as in the actual exercise of their ministry when they left England. Owing to the revival of the old discontents, a council was called, consisting of the most distinguished members of the Plymouth and Massachusetts colonies, among them, Wilson of the First church, Boston, Shepherd of Cambridge and John Eliot of Roxbury, known as the Apostle to the Indians. An adjustment of the difficulties followed, although some traces of the discontent survived for years thereafter. In 1651, Emanuel White and Robert Allen were at the court charged with villifying Mr. Miller, and were acquitted ; and the next year Mr. Miller's opponents returned the charge by having him cited to answer for remarks in a sermon against the govern- ment. The court so far noticed this matter as to instruct the jury to "make due inquiry to vindicate the government." No further mention is made of the matter in the public records, and the religions discontents of the time gradually, though not wholly, subsided. Mr. Eliot, while engaged in his pacific mission embraced the opportunity to commence his work of christianizing the Indians of this town, which he prosecuted for some time with much zeal and activity, in the face of many difficulties and disconragements. With the settlement of the proprietorship of the lands, and in a large degree of the ministerial troubles, Yarmouth commenced a career of steady growth and prosperous development.
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Barnstable, the region lying between Sandwich and Yarmouth, was settled in the early part of 1639. The first comers were Elder Thomas Dimmock, who was there in. March of that year, and Rev. Joseph Hull, who arrived two months later. To them the court granted the lands in the town, on the usual conditions and with the customary restrictions. The lands in the eastern portion of the town were sometime in 1637-8 surveyed by Mr. Collicut of Dorchester, to whom a grant of them had been made by the court. It was doubtless under the authority of this grant that Mr. Bachelor had made his abortive attempt in 1638. Mr. Dimmock was probably one of the associates of Collicut, and Mr. Hull belonged to the same company. With Messrs. Dimmoek and Hull there came, in the spring of that year, some fifteen families. A church was estab- lished here, though not formally organized, of which Mr. Hull was pastor and Rev. John Mayo preaching elder. No .. church edifice was erected, though tradition pointed out the large rock-only a portion of which remains-on the highway between Barnstable and West Barnstable, as the spot where they were accustomed to meet. This rock stood in front of the residence of the late Edward Scudder. It has been gradually carried away, a portion of it having been used in building the old jail. During the summer months this arrangement was convenient and natural, and under the overshadowing oaks and pines by the roadside, these devout men and women could commune through nature with nature's . God.
Oct. 11, 1639, Rev. John Lothrop and some twenty-five families from Scituate arrived in Barnstable, in accordance with arrangements previously made. They had become dissatisfied with their location, "Scituate being too straite for their accommodation," and were attracted to this region, ..
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as were the first settlers to Yarmouth, by the extensive salt marshes, which afforded subsistence for their cattle, while the lands cleared by the Indians gave them tillage spots for planting. Mr. Lothrop was a man distinguished for his piety and talents. He was educated at Christ college, Cambridge, took holy orders and settled in the ministry in Egerton, near London, but renounced the orders and separated himself from the church of England. In 1624 he was chosen successor to Rev. Henry Jacob, the first pastor of the first Independent or Congregational church in London. Hle was pastor of this church for eight years, when he and about fifty of his congregation were arrested, and refusing to take the oath ex officio, were thrown into prison, where they remained for two years. He came to this country in 1634 in the ship Griffin, in company with the famous Mrs. Ann Hutchinson, and late in the fall of 1634 came to Scituate, where a small settlement had been made. Here a church was formed and Mr. Lothrop elected pastor. They found that they had made a mistake and songht and secured a new location here. With Mr. Lothrop came several men of weight and character, among them, Anthony Annable, Henry Cobb, William Crocker, Samuel Hinckley, George Lewis, Isaac Robinson, William Baker. James Cudworth came a little later, but subsequently returned to Scituate. John Bursley, Austin Bearse, James Hamlin, Thomas Huckins, Thomas Allyn, John Seudder, Nathaniel Bacon, Roger Goodspeed, Dolar Davis, Mr. John Mayo, Alvan Blush and John Hull were early here. The greater portion of Mr. Lothrop's associates had been connected with him in church relations, both in Scituate and London, but the church organization was retained in London after the removal, and Mr. Lothrop never claimed to represent it here. In fact he spoke of himself, according to Gov.
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Winthrop, while in Boston, as outside of any organized church at that time. The London church survived for some eight years after Mr. Lothrop removed to America. The claim that the West Barnstable church represents the first Independent church organization, can hardly be sustained.
Mr. Lothrop and his associates were cordially welcomed by those who had preceded them in Barnstable. Oct. 31, " a feast was held to implore the grace of God to settle us here in church estate, and to unite us together in holy walking, and to make us faithful in keeping covenant with God and one another." On the 11th day of December O. S., the first day of Thanksgiving was held. The service was observed at Mr. Hull's house. The object of the meeting was to give thanks to God for his exceeding mercy in bringing them safe to Barnstable, preserving their health "in the weak beginnings of their plantation and in their church estate." The day was very cold, and after the close of public service they divided into "three companies to feast together, some at Mr. Hull's, some at Mr. Mayo's, and some at Brother Lumbard, senior's." What a delightful record of mutual help, thanksgiving and good cheer !
The winter of 1639-40 was open and cold, but no deaths were reported, and but little sickness occurred among the company. The division of the common lands engrossed much attention, as was natural. It was greatly to the credit of the settlers that they accomplished this without contro- versy or angry discussion. April 25, 1640, was set apart as a day of fasting, to invoke the divine blessing on their efforts, and the following rule of division of lands, adopted by the general consent of the inhabitants, was satisfactory to all interested : "One-third part to every houselot, equally ; one-third to the names that are immovable; and the other third according to men's estates." This rule was adhered to
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in all the subsequent divisions. At a town meeting held in 1641, measurers of land were appointed, and the details of the measurement settled. In 1643, Mr. Hatherly, Mr. Freeman and Capt. Standish were appointed by the court " to divide to each man, the lands at Barnstable, reserving a portion for public use." The town subsequently ordered " that the commons, or undistributed lands, shall belong to the present inhabitants, and to whom they shall see fit," and "that the commons be entailed to the houselots."
Before a full and complete title of the soil could be acquired, it was necessary to extinguish the Indian titles. Fortunately for the settlers, there was land enough for their occupation and improvement, without doing violence or wrong to the natives of the soil. The pestilence which had decimated the Indians in Plymouth before the coming of the Pilgrim fathers, had raged upon the Cape, and after the death of the noble Iyanough, his heirs, with their thinned ranks of subjects, ranged over a large region, embracing the present territory of the western part of Yarmouth, East Barnstable, Hyannis, and the vast stretch of land known as the "South sea" region. The natives had no use for all these lands and parted with them for what seems a trifle in these days, but what to the Indians was no doubt regarded as ample compensation. They could still take game and fish, first at one spot then at another, in this region, and that was all they wanted of the place. Small tillage lots were reserved for their use, which they or their successors improved while any of them survived.
Next to the division of the lands, here as in adjoining towns, polemical discussion seems to have been the most fruitful source of dissension. In the case of the Barnstable settlers, personal predilections and individual claims, rather than matters of doctrine, led to the first troubles in the
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church organization. Mr. Joseph IIull was the earliest minister in town; he came in the day of weakness of the church ; he was a man of good character and respectable abilities. But he was not equal in talent and learning to Mr. Lothrop. Mr. Hull, it will be seen, extended to Mr. Lothrop on his coming the warmest Christian greetings and hospitalities. He assisted on April 15, in the following year, in the ordination of Mr. John Mayo as teaching elder, and in the following month we find the record of his excommunication by the church, for, as they say, "willfully breaking his communion with us, and joining a company in Yarmouth to be their pastor, contrary to the counsel and advice of our church." The cause of all this lies upon the surface. The great majority of the Barnstable church preferred their former pastor, Mr. Lothrop, for a minister, and Mr. Hull was ignored, not only in that relation, but was dropped from his position as deputy from the town to the colony court. The society in Yarmouth was not united upon Mr. Matthews, and these dissenters, together with the personal friends of Mr. Hull in Barnstable, desired to form a society with Mr. Hull as pastor. This natural arrange- ment, under the circumstances, was in opposition to the policy of the governing class in the colony, and when Mr. Hull attempted to exercise the duties of a pastor, he was proceeded against. There was no allegation of immorality or unsoundness of doctrine. But he was dealt with as rigorously as if there had been. A warrant was issued to the constable to arrest him if he attempted to exercise the pastoral office ; and he and his wife were excommunicated. So long as these restrictions were in force, it was social and political death to them. The struggle was an unequal one ; Mr. Hull desisted, made an "acknowledgment of his sin," was received back into the church, and the following year
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removed to Dover. Mr. Lothrop was in full control of the church and society, until the end of his useful and successful career, in 1653, the date of his death.
It was not until several years had elapsed that a regular house of worship was erected ; they met at the residences of the members; their pastor's, Mr. Cudworth's and Mr. Bursley's, and June 1, 1646, Mr. Lothrop was enabled to add in his diary, that this was "the second of our meeting in our meeting-house." This structure stood in the ancient graveyard near the present County road, where the ashes of so many of the fathers of the town repose.
Mr. Lothrop and his associates appear to have been in complete sympathy with the Independent cause in the mother country. A fast was held March 16, 1648, "principally for Old England, requested by Sir Thomas Fairfax and the Parliament, in regard to many fears of the Presbyterians, with many others, to raise up new wars in the land, and, notwithstanding all their troubles, much pride and excess abounding, with an unframed spirit, to humble themselves by praying and seeking with God." November 5, a day of humiliation "was kept by the church, principally for Old England." And March 4, 1652, was observed as "thanks- giving for the Lord's powerful working for Old England by Oliver Cromwell and his army, against the Scots .*
In 1644 the settlement of Eastham, which had several years been in contemplation, was effected. This region, under the name of Nauset, had been familiar to the English from their first coming to these shores. Here was the " first encounter" with the Indians. To Nauset had often resorted trading parties from Plymouth, to replenish their fast vanishing stock of provisions, of which the natives had more than their own need. About 1643, the inhabitants of *Mr. Lothrop's Diary.
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Plymouth, becoming dissatisfied with their location, began to look about them for a new place of settlement. It seems strange to those of the present day, who are acquainted with the features of the two localities, that Nauset should have been seriously considered as the more eligible place of residence ; but the fact that Nauset had within its borders a large area of grain-producing lands, not then exhausted by a vicious system of agriculture, explains their preference. Gov. Bradford and others proposing Nauset for a settlement, a committee was appointed to explore the premises, and obtained permission to occupy it from those who had obtained a grant of the territory in 1640. Subsequent explorations having been made, it was decided that the place was not sufficiently extensive for the accommodation of the whole Plymouth company, and that it was not centrally situated for the scat of the government of the colony. But several of the Plymouth church being resolved upon removal, a grant was obtained of the court, of "all the traet of land lying between sea and sea, from the purchasers' bounds from Namskaket to the herring brook, at Billingsgate, with said herring brook and all the meadows on both sides of said brook, with the great bass-pond there, and all the meadows and islands lying within the said tract." This grant embraced a region of about 15 miles in length, extending from the present towns of Brewster to Truro, from Barnstable Bay across to the Atlantic Ocean. The leading men of this settlement, John Doane, Nicholas Snow, Josias Cook, Richard Higgins, John Smalley and Edward Bangs, were parted with regretfully by their associates at Plymouth. They were highly esteemed by, and in full sympathy with, the governing class at Plymouth, and commenced the settlement under favorable auspices, and their numbers were so augmented by accessions that June 2,
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1646, an act of incorporation in the following terms was passed : "Nauset is granted to be a township and to have all the privileges of a township, as other towns within the government have." They soon after organized by choosing Nicholas Snow town clerk, Edward Bangs treasurer, and Josias Cook constable. A meeting-house, 20 feet square, with thatched roof, and port holes in the sides, was erected near Town Cove. Rev. John Mayo, who went from Barn- stable in 1646, remained in the exercise of the ministry at Nauset, until 1655, when he was called to the second church in Boston. In 1647 Joseph Rogers was appointed to exercise the men of Nauset in the use of arms, and in June, 1648, it was ordered that the public rate of Nauset, this year and the future time, shall be 40s. In 1651 it was "ordered that the town of Nanset henceforth be called and known by the name of EASTHAM."
Thus was accomplished the permanent settlement npon the Cape of four towns, under conditions differing but little from each other, and by people of similar origin, faith and condition in life. The few detached settlements elsewhere, as at Succannessett and Monomoy, were placed "within the liberties" of some other town, as the legal phraseology of the times ran. But it was contrary to the policy of the colony to encourage settlements, except by such numbers as would insure the establishment and maintenance of a minister within their borders.
Nearly cocval with the settlement of the Cape, in the year 1639, occurred a radical change in the form of government of Plymouth colony, from a nearly democratic, to a representative, government. The inhabitants of the towns in the colony had heretofore been accustomed to go to Plymouth for the transaction of the public business and the
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election of officers. The remainder of the year the entire administration of the government, legislative, judicial and executive, rested with the governor and his assistants. In 1638 the towns were authorized to send deputies to join with the bench to enact and make all such laws and ordi- nances as shall be deemed good and wholesome for the whole." But the laws to be enacted were to be proposed at one session and not considered until the next, and the court reserved the right to reject and dismiss all those deputies or committees who were "found insufficient or troublesome" ! This change went into effect in 1639, and Sandwich and Yarmouth were represented at the June session, and Barnstable at the December term ensuing, by the following deputies, or committees, as they are sometimes styled : Sandwich, Richard Bourne, Thomas Armitage, Mr. John Vincent. Yarmouth, Thomas Payne, Philip Tabor. Barn- stable, Mr. Joseph Hull, Mr. Thomas Dimmock. Of scarcely less importance was the office of constable, upon the incumbants of which depended in great measure the good order and obedience to the law-making power of the little communities. William Chase was the incumbent from Yarmouth from March to October, when he was succeeded by William Clark; Thomas Armitage was selected, in March, for Sandwich, and in June had George Allen for associate ; Wm. Carsely was chosen in June for Barnstable.
Together with the new representative system, a local judicial tribunal was created for hearing controversies between the parties within the townships of Sandwich, Barnstable, and Yarmouth, involving cases of not exceeding 20 shillings. Mr. Edmund Freeman of Sandwich, who was one of the assistants of the governor, together with Mr. Thomas Dimmock of Barnstable and Mr. John Crow of Yarmouth, constituted the court. How long it existed, or
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the extent of its business, is not known by any record extant.
The same year a special session of the assistants was held in Yarmouth, June 17th, at which Edward Winslow, Miles Standish and Edmund Freeman, gentlemen, presided, to hear and determine causes pending in Yarmouth, and fix the boundaries between that town and the adjacent territory. These controversies referred more especially to differences respecting the boundaries and fencing of individual lots, small trespasses by Indians and matters requiring arbitration, rather than judicial process. The bounds of Yarmouth on the east were defined to be from Bound Brook river, now the western limit of Brewster, with a liberal reservation for Mashantampaine, the Indian sagamore, on the borders of
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