USA > Massachusetts > Chronicles of the first planters of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, 1623-1636 > Part 28
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1 Walter Palmer, probably a bro- ther of Abraham, removed soon after 1642 to Rehoboth, of which town he was one of the first settlers, and there died, about 1662, leaving
eleven children. One of them, John, probably the eldest, remained in Charlestown. See Frothingham, p. 23, and Bliss's Rehoboth, p. 70. 2 On the east side of Main-street.
378
THE SETTLERS BUILD ON THE TOWN HILL.
CHAP. the report of the great guns at Salem, only shot off XIX. to clear them ; by which means they were so fright-
- 1630. ed, that all their companies scattered and ran away ; and though they came flattering afterwards, and call- ed themselves our good friends, yet were we con- strained by their conspiracies yearly to be in arms.1
June and July.
In the months of June and July, 1629, arrived at this town, John Winthrop, Esq. Governor, Sir Rich- ard Saltonstall, knight, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Dudley, Mr. Ludlow, Mr. Nowell, Mr. Pincheon, Mr. Broad- street ; who brought along with them the charter or patent for this jurisdiction of the Massachusetts Bay ; with whom also arrived Mr. John Wilson and Mr. [blank] Phillips, ministers, and a multitude of people, amounting to about fifteen hundred, brought over from England in twelve ships.2 The Governor and several of the Patentees dwelt in the great house, which was last year built in this town by Mr. Graves and the rest of their servants.
The multitude set up cottages, booths and tents about the Town Hill. They had long passage; some of the ships were seventeen, some eighteen weeks a coming. Many people arrived sick of the scurvy, which also increased much after their arrival, for want of houses, and by reason of wet lodging in their cottages, &c. Other distempers also prevailed ; and although [the] people were generally very loving and pitiful, yet the sickness did so prevail, that the whole were not able to tend the sick, as they should
1 There is no account of this In- dian conspiracy in Morton's Memo- rial, or anywhere else. As Graves did not come over till June, 1629, it
must have occurred, if it occurred at all, in the next year, 1630. See Prince, p. 277.
2 See note 2 on page 311.
379
SICKNESS AND FAMINE.
be tended ; upon which many perished and died,1 CHAP. and were buried about the Town Hill. By which ~
1630. July.
XIX. means [the] provisions were exceedingly wasted, and no supplies could now be expected by planting. Besides, there was miserable damage and spoil of provisions by sea, and divers came not so well pro- vided as they would, upon a report, whilst they were in England, that now there was enough in New-Eng- land. And unto all this there [some few words missing] [and yet some imprudently selling much of the re- mainder2] to the Indians for beaver. All which being taken into consideration by the Governor and gentlemen, they hired and despatched away Mr. William Pearce, with his ship, of about two hundred . tons, for Ireland, to buy more ;3 and in the mean time went on with their work for settling. In order to which they, with Mr. John Wilson, one of the ministers, did gather a church, and chose the said 30. Mr. Wilson pastor ; the greatest number all this time intending nothing more than settling in this town ; for which the Governor ordered his house to be cut and framed here. But the weather being hot, many sick, and others faint after their long voyage, people grew discontented for want of water, who generally notioned no water good for a town but running springs.4 And though this neck do abound with good water, yet, for want of experience and
ning water was one of the reasons offered Dec. 14, 1630, which de- cided the question in the negative about building a fortified town on the neck between Boston and Rox- bury. See Savage's Winthrop, i. 38, and Chronicles of Plymouth,
1 See pages 314, 319, and 325.
2 The words enclosed in [ ] are obliterated in the MS., being at the bottom of a page ; but restored from Prince, p. 313, who copied from the original.
3 See pages 315 and 340.
4 This same prejudice about run- note 4 on page 129.
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380
NO GOOD WATER AT CHARLESTOWN.
CHAP. industry, none could then be found to suit the humor XIX. - of that time, but a brackish spring in the sands, by 1630. the water side,1 on the west side of the North-west July. Field,2 which could not supply half the necessities of the multitude; at which time the death of so many was concluded to be much the more occasion- ed by this want of good water.3
This caused several to go abroad upon discovery. Some went without the neck of this town, who trav- elled up into the main till they came to a place well watered ; whither Sir Richard Saltonstall, knight, and Mr. [blank] Phillips, minister, went with several others, and settled a plantation, and called it Water- town. Others went on the other side of Charles river, and there travelled up into the country, and likewise finding good waters, settled there with Mr. Ludlow, and called the plantation Dorchester ; whither went Mr. [blank] Maverick and Mr. [blank] Warham, who were their ministers.
In the mean time Mr. [blank] Blackstone,4 dwell- ing on the other side Charles river alone, at a place
1 This spring is supposed to have been not far from the site of the Winthrop Church, on the shore, to the south of the State's Prison. See Mass. Hist. Coll. xii. 165, and Frothingham's Charlestown, p. 31. 2 The north-west field was in the vicinity of Washington-street.
3 Edward Johnson, one of the sufferers, tells us, "The grief of this people was further increased by the sore sickness which befell among them, so that almost in every family lamentation, mourning, and wo was heard ; and no fresh food to be had to cherish them. It would assuredly have moved the most locked-up af- fections to tears, no doubt, had they passed from one hut to another, and
beheld the piteous case these people were in. And that which added to their present distress, was the want of fresh water. For although the place did afford plenty, yet, for the present, they could find but one spring, and that not to be come at but when the tide was down ; which caused many to pass over to the south side of the river, where they afterwards erected some other towns, and in October the Governor, Depu- ty, and Assistants, held their second Court, on the south side of the river, where they began to build, holding correspondency with Charlestown, as one and the same." See Mass. Hist. Coll. xii. 87.
4 See note 3 on page 169.
381
BLACKSTONE'S SPRING IN BOSTON.
by the Indians called Shawmutt, where he only had CHAP. a cottage, at or not far off the place called Black- XIX. stone's Point, he came and acquainted the Governor 1630. of an excellent spring there ; withal inviting him and soliciting him thither. Whereupon, after the death of Mr. Johnson1 and divers others, the Gov- Sept. ernor, with Mr. Wilson and the greatest part of the 30. church, removed thither ; whither also the frame of the Governor's house, in preparation at this town, was also (to the discontent of some,) carried ;2 where people began to build their houses against winter ; and this place was called Boston.
After these things Mr. [blank] Pincheon and seve- ral others planted betwixt Boston and Dorchester ; which place was called Roxbury.
Now after all this, the Indians' treachery being feared, it was judged meet the English should place their towns as near together as could be. For which end Mr. Dudley and Mr. Broadstreet, with some others, went and built and planted between Charles- town and Waterton ; who called it Newtown, which was afterwards called Cambridge.3
Others issued out to a place between Charlestown and Salem, called Saugust, since ordered to be call- ed Linn.4
And thus, by reason of discouragements and diffi- culties, that strangers in a wilderness at first meet
1 Isaac Johnson died Sept. 30. See note 3 on page 317.
2 A similar dissatisfaction was felt when Winthrop removed the frame of his house from Newtown (Cambridge) to Boston, in 1632. See page 339, and Winthrop, i. 82.
3 In 1638, out of regard to the place where so many of their minis-
ters and magistrates had been edu- cated. See note 2 on page 357, and Winthrop, i. 265.
4 So called in 1636, out of com- pliment, no doubt, to the Rev. Sam- uel Whiting, the minister of the place, who had been a preacher at Lynn Regis, in Norfolk, England. See Winthrop, i. 204.
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382
THE COLONISTS SCATTERED.
CHAP. withal, though as to some things but supposed, as in XIX .. this case people might have found water abundant in 1630. this town, and needed not to have perished for want, or wandered to other places for relief, would they but have looked after it. But this, attended with other circumstances, the wisdom of God made use of as a means for spreading his Gospel and peopling of this great and then terrible wilderness ; and this sudden spreading into several townships came to be of far better use for the entertainment of so many hundreds of people, that came for several years fol- lowing hither in such multitudes from most parts of Old England, than if they had now remained all to- gether in this town.
But after their departure from this town to the peopling and planting of the towns aforesaid, and in particular of the removal of the Governor, and the greatest part of our new gathered church, with the pastor, to Boston, the few inhabitants of this town remaining were constrained, for three1 years after, generally to go to Boston on the Lord's day to hear the word and enjoy the sacraments, before they could be otherwise supplied.
A list of the names of such as stayed and became inhabitants of this town in this year 1629, as follows :
Increase Nowell, Esq .; 2 Mr. William Aspinwall ;3
1 It was only two years ; for the Charlestown church was gathered and the covenant entered into, Nov. 2, 1632. See Budington's Hist. of First Church in Charlestown, pages 21 and 183; and Frothingham's Hist. of Charlestown, p. 70.
See note 2 on page 262.
3 William Aspinwall afterwards
removed to Boston. Taking an ac- tive part in the Antinomian contro- versy, and having written the peti- tion to the General Court in favor of Wheelwright, in 1637, he was dis- franchised, disarmed, and banished. Whereupon he retired, with Cod- dington and others, to Rhode Island, and was the first Secretary of that
383
NAMES OF THE FIRST PLANTERS.
Mr. Richard Palsgrave;1 Edward Convers;2 William CHAP. Penn ;3 William Hudson ; 4 Mr. John Glover ;5 Wil- XIX.
1630.
liam Brackenburry ;6 Rice Cole ;7 Hugh Garrett ; Ezekiel Richeson ;8 John Baker ;9 John Sales ; 10 Capt. [blank] Norton ;11 Mr. Edward Gibbons ; 12 Mr. William Jennings ; John Wignall ; these four went and built in the main, on the north-east side of the north-west creek of this town.
Colony. In 1642 he returned to Boston, tendered his submission, and was reconciled to the Church and State. He afterwards went to England, where he died. See Sav- age's Winthrop, i. 33, 245, 248, ii. 62 ; Callender's Rhode Island, p. 84.
1 Richard Palsgrave was the first physician in Charlestown. He came from Stepney, in the county of Mid- dlesex, in England, and died about 1656, leaving a widow, Anne, who removed to Roxbury. See Froth- ingham, p. 78.
2 Edward Converse was the first ferryman between Boston and Charlestown, and one of the first settlers of Woburn, whither he re- moved as early as 1643, and which town he represented in 1660. He died Aug. 6, 1663, leaving a widow, Sarah, and three sons and two daughters. See Winthrop, ii. 349, and Frothingham, p. 78.
3 I find no such name as William Penn among the colonists. It is probably an error for James Penn, who was chosen Aug. 23, 1630, " as a beadle, to attend upon the Gov- ernor, and always to be ready to execute his commands in public business." He was a ruling elder, a representative in 1648, and a lead- ing man in the church and common- wealth. He died Sept. 30, 1671. See Col. Rec .; Winthrop, ii. 213, 216, 348 ; Prince, p. 404 ; Hutch- inson's Mass. i. 269.
4 William Hudson removed to Boston about 1640, and in 1643 re- turned to England, and engaged in
military service on the Parliament's side. See Snow's Boston, p. 108; Frothingham, p. 78.
5 John Glover removed to Dor- chester, where he became a promi- nent man, was a selectman, a cap- tain, a representative in 1637, and an Assistant in 1652. Edward Johnson calls him "a man strong for the truth, a plain, sincere, godly man, and of good abilities." He died in Jan. 1654. See Winthrop, i. 46, 212; Mass. Hist. Coll. xiv. 24.
6 William Brackenbury was a baker, and one of the principal men of Malden, and died in Aug. 1668, aged 66.
7 Rise Coles was admitted a free- man April 1, 1633, and died May 15, 1646.
8 Ezekiel Richardson was one of the first settlers of Woburn, and there died Oct. 28, 1647.
9 John Baker was a tailor, and removed from Charlestown in 1637. 10 John Sales enjoys the unenvia- ble reputation of having been " the first known thief that was notori- ously observed in the country." See page 385.
11 He was killed by the Pequots in 1633. See Winthrop, i. 123.
12 Edward Gibbons, according to Scottow, "being the younger bro- ther of the house, of an honorable extract, and his ambition exceeding what he could expect at home, he rambled hither." He was origin- ally one of Wollaston's plantation, and a young gentleman " of a jocund
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384
TWO ACRES ALLOTTED TO EACH PLANTER.
CHAP. XIX. Agreed and concluded by the inhabitants of this town, that the great corn-field shall be on the east 1630. side of the Town Hill; the fence to range along even with those dwellings1 where Walter Palmer's house stands, and so along towards the neck of land ; and that to every inhabitant dwelling within the neck, be given two acres of land for a house-plot, and two acres for every male that is able to plant. But in consideration of the greatness of the charge in fencing down to the neck of land, it is concluded, that that be suspended at present, and that only a cross fence be drawn at the neck of land from Mis- ticke river to the water on the west of the neck ; which, being computed, ariseth to one pole and two foot an acre for so many acres as are at present allot- ted ; and that the cattle be kept without upon the main.
But now, as the winter came on, provisions began
temper ;" but being at Salem in August, 1629, when the church was gathered and the ministers or- dained, he was so much affected by the solemnities, that he requested to be admitted to their fellowship. This request, however, was pru- dently declined on the ground of his being a stranger. He was soon af- terwards admitted to the Boston church. Winthrop mentions Gib- bons's " farm at Pullen Point ;" and Edward Johnson, describing the country as it appeared in 1630, says, " about one mile distant, (from Noddle's island,) upon the river, (Charles,) ran a small creek, taking its name from major general Ed- ward Gibbons, who dwelt there for some time after." He represented Charlestown in the General Court in 1635 and 1636 ; soon after which he removed to Boston, and became largely engaged in trade and navi-
gation. He lost £2500 when La Tour's fort at St. John's was taken by D'Aulney in 1645, by which loss, says Winthrop, he was quite un- done. He was chosen an Assist- ant in 1650, and was major general of all the forces from 1649 to 1651. Johnson, who knew him, and was himself a soldier, speaks of him as " a man of a resolute spirit, bold as a lion, being wholly tutored up in New-England discipline, very gen- erous, and forward to promote all military matters." He died Dec. 9, 1654, leaving two sons, Jotham and John, who were born in Boston in 1633 and 1641. See Savage's Winthrop, i. 192, ii. 60, 238; Ma- ther, i. 329 ; Scottow's Narrative, p. 10; Hutchinson's Mass. i. 135, 160; Mass. Hist. Coll. xii. 86, xvii. 54.
1 This was the beginning of Main- street. Frothingham, p. 59.
385
ARRIVAL OF PROVISIONS.
to be very scarce, upon the grounds aforesaid, and CHAP. people were necessitated to live upon clams, and XIX. muscles, and ground-nuts, and acorns, and these got 1630. with much difficulty in the winter time. Upon which, people were very much tired and discour- aged, especially when they heard that the Governor himself had the last batch of bread in the oven ;1 and many were the fears of people that Mr. Pearce, who was sent to Ireland to fetch provisions, was cast away, or taken by pirates. But God, who delights to appear in greatest straits, did work marvellously at this time ; for before the very day appointed to seek the Lord by fasting and prayer, about the month of February or March, in comes Mr. Pearce, 1631. laden with provisions. Upon which occasion the Feb. day of Fast was changed, and ordered to be kept as 5. a day of Thanksgiving ;2 which provisions were by 22. the Governor distributed unto the people propor- tionable to their necessities.
The summer this year proving short and wet, our 1632. crops of Indian corn, (for all this while we had no other,) was very small ; and great want threatened us. At which time here happened in this town the first known thief that was notoriously observed in the country. His name was John Sales ; who, hav- ing stolen corn from many people in this scarce time, was convicted thereof before the Court, and openly
1 See pages 351 and 379. Ma- ther says, that "on Feb. 5, 1631, when he [Winthrop] was distribut- ing the last handful of meal in the barrel unto a poor man distressed by the wolf at the door, at that in-
stant they spied a ship arrived at the harbour's mouth laden with pro- visions for them all." See Mather's Magnalia, i. 111 ; Savage's note on Winthrop, i. 46.
2 See pages 330 and 332.
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386
MORTALITY AMONG THE INDIANS.
CHAP. punished, and all he had by law condemned and sold, XIX.
to make restitution.
1633. This winter also proved very sharp and long, and people were generally exceedingly pinched for want of provisions ; for there came very little over this year from England. But it pleased God to send an unexpected and early supply ; for one Mr. Stratton arrived here with his vessel in the beginning of March. March, laden with Indian corn, from Virginia, which he sold for ten shillings per bushel.
At this time began a most grievous and terrible sickness amongst the Indians, who were exceeding numerous about us, (called the Aberginians.) Their disease was generally the small pox, which raged not only amongst these, but amongst the Eastern Indians also, and in a few months swept away multi- tudes of them, young and old. They could not bury their dead ; the English were constrained to help ;1 and that which is very remarkable is, that though the English did frequently visit them in their sick- ness, notwithstanding the infection, it was observed that not one Englishman was touched with the dis- ease. But it was extremely infectious among them- selves, and mortal where it took any of them ; inso- much as there was scarce any of them left. By
1 " It wrought much with them," says Winthrop, "that when their own people forsook them, yet the English came daily and ministered to them ; and yet few, only two families, took any infection by it. Among others, Mr. Maverick, of Winesemett, is worthy of a per- petual remembrance. Himself, his wife, and servants, went daily to them, ministered to their necessi-
ties, and buried their dead, and took home many of their children. So did other of the neighbours." Ed- ward Johnson, a contemporary, re- cords the same general facts in his History of New-England, printed in 1654. See note 4 on page 306, and Winthrop, i. 119, 120; Morton's Memorial, p. 175; Hutchinson's Mass. i. 34 ; Mass. Hist. Coll. xiii. 127.
387
THE CHARLESTOWN RECORDS.
which awful and admirable dispensation it pleased CHAP. God to make room for his people of the English na- XIX. tion ; who, after this, in the immediate years follow- 1634. ing, came from England by many hundreds every year to us, who, without this remarkable and terrible stroke of God upon the natives, would with much more difficulty have found room, and at far greater charge have obtained and purchased land.1
1 Prince enumerates among the manuscripts which he used in com- piling his Annals of New-England, " the ancient records of the town of Charlestown; in the first volume whereof is a particular history of the first coming and settling of the Eng- lish there and in the neighbouring places." And afterwards, in quot- ing them, he says that they were " written by Mr. Increase Nowell, afterwards town-clerk of Charles- town, and Secretary of the Mas- sachusetts Colony." But this is a mistake. Increase Nowell was town-clerk in 1636 and 1637, and assisted Abraham Palmer in the same office in 1639. But the re- cords which he made are not now in existence. The earliest records now extant, from which the preced- ing Chapter is taken, were copied in 1664, nine years after Nowell's death, as appears by the following order. " At a meeting of the Se- lectmen, April 18, 1664, John Greene is appointed by us to trans- cribe the records of this town; and having begun the same in a book as
far as to folio eight, most whereof is gathered by information of known gentlemen that lived and were actors in those times, we do approve of the same, and consent that what is writ- ten on those seven pages remain as it is." Of course this record is not a contemporaneous document, but a digest from early papers and tradi- tion. It contains, indeed, many in- teresting statements, and some few facts not to be found elsewhere. Yet, as an authority, it is not to be put upon a level with Dudley's touching Letter, or even with Roger Clap's homely Narrative. Its chro- nology, too, is all wrong, anticipat- ing a whole year, in a most extraor- dinary manner, making Graves and Bright arrive in 1628, and Governor Winthrop and his company in 1629. It may be that this error extends also to the arrival of the Spragues, and that they did not come to Charlestown till 1629. See Prince's Annals, pp. xvii. 250 ; and Froth- ingham's History of Charlestown, pp. 2, 14, 61.
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Wood's Mep of Massachusetts drawn in 1633
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WILLIAM WOOD'S
DESCRIPTION OF MASSACHUSETTS.
NEW-ENGLANDS PROSPECT. A true, lively, and experimentall description of that part of America, commonly called NEVV ENGLAND : discovering the state of that Countrie, both as it stands to our new-come English Planters ; and to the old Native Inhabitants.
Laying downe that which may both enrich the knowledge of the mind-travelling Reader, or benefit the future Voyager. By WILLIAM WOOD.
Printed at London by Tho. Cotes, for John Bellamie, and are to be sold at his shop, at the three Golden Lyons in Corne-hill, neere the Royall Exchange. 1634. sm. 4to. pp .. 112.
CHAPTER XX.
OF THE BAYS, HAVENS, INLETS, AND SEVERAL PLANT- ATIONS OF NEW-ENGLAND.
CHAP. XX. 1633.
FORASMUCH as the King's most excellent Majesty hath been graciously pleased, by the grant of his letters patents, at first to give life to the Plantations of New-England, and hath daily, likewise, by his favors and royal protection, cherished their growing hopes ; whereby many of his Majesty's faithful sub- jects have been emboldened to venture persons, states, and endeavours, to the enlargement of his dominions in that western continent ; wherefore I thought fit, for the further encouragement of those that hereafter, either by purse or person, shall help forward the Plantation, to set forth these few obser- vations, out of my personal and experimental know- ledge.
The place whereon the English have built their Colonies, is judged by those who have best skill in discovery, either to be an island,1 surrounded on the
1 The first settlers of New-Eng- and. See Chronicles of Plymouth, land generally considered it an isl- pp. 256, 368.
392
MASSACHUSETTS BAY.
CHAP. north side with the spacious river Cannada, and on XX. the south with Hudson's river ; or else a peninsula, 1633. these two rivers overlapping one another, having their rise from the great lakes, which are not far off one another, as the Indians do certainly inform us. But it is not my intent to wander far from our Patent ; wherefore I refer you to the thrice memorable dis- coverer of those parts, Capt. Smith, who hath like- wise fully described the southern and north-east parts of New-England, with the noted headlands, capes, harbours, rivers, ponds, and lakes, with the nature of the soil, and commodities both by sea and land, &c. within the degrees of forty-one and forty- five.1
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