USA > Massachusetts > Barnstable County > Eastham > Eastham, Massachusetts, 1651-1951 > Part 3
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EARLY TOWN AFFAIRS
Scanning Eastham's early years as reflected in town and colony records one finds mostly pieces fitting into a picture of the first settlers as tillers of the soil. The buying and selling of lands, placing of bounds, marking of domestic animals, iron- ing out of boundary disputes between neighbors and Indians, fill many volumes. In the vital records one finds page after page of entries showing much "a-borning, a-marrying and a-dying."
While Eastham was still Nauset one finds the Grand In- quest at Plymouth presenting it in 1650 "for want of sufficient pounds" for its stock; and that this little worried the pioneers
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THE FOUNDING OF EASTHAM
is clear, for five years later Eastham was again indicted for lack- ing a pound. By Court decree, "the marke for horses for dis- tinction of the townes," in Eastham was "an E on the farr shoulder." Other marks were also required for each man's animals, and fill many pages of town records, such as "Ear Marks. The mark of the cattle of Joseph Myrick is a swallows tail cut in the top of the left eare." Land records are volumi- nous, too, bounding men's acres by such as stakes and stones and trees, black walnuts, maples, cedars, pines and a variety of oaks.
One is tempted to quote innumerable old town acts and regulations which ring so strangely on our ears now, though when adopted they formed quite a natural part of the fabric of life as people lived it here three centuries ago.
Wolves roamed Nauset then, one notes. Bounties were paid on four in Eastham in 1654, and another four the follow- ing year. Blackbirds and crows often drove our tillers of the soil to enact measures such as that requiring every housekeeper to kill twelve annually or be fined, and oft quoted is Eastham's special variation, forbidding single men to marry until they had killed their six blackbirds or three crows. Indians appear in manv town acts, such as the curious law of 1674 forbidding residents to furnish them oysters, on penalty of five shillings for every bushel so furnished, or to be whipped; and an act dated three years later. forbidding any to give, trade or lend to Indians silver money "by which liquors are bought."
Citizens' duties were not taken lightly when Eastham was voung. Absence from town meeting could cost a citizen a fine of two shillings in 1659, and departing without leave before the meeting was dismissed could cost another shilling penalty. Later a distance of seven miles from meeting house was set as that radius from which perfect attendance at town meeting was ex- pected, or a fine levied. Warning out of undesired citizens was practiced here as elsewhere in the colony. And so the records go, and rather heavy going, too, although the vital records are still often searched, because so many fine old American fam- ilies, the Doanes, Snows, Freemans, Smiths, Sparrows, Knowles,
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
et als, trace some of their first ancestors to those who settled Nauset.
Eastham's vital records begin with entries of 1675, but several pages of earlier ones may be found in Plymouth Colony records. Some may be missing by the crumbling of an old book, but if those surviving are oldest, then the town's first marriage was a romantic wedding of two of Thomas Prince's daughters: Mercy to John Freeman, and Hannah to Nathaniel Mayo, on February 13, 1649. And among the town's first births were twins, too: "Marcye and Apphyah, the daughters of Edwards Banges, which said daughters were born, being twines, were born the 15th of October, 1651." These, "Pr. me, Daniell Cole, Towne Clerke."
Here and there one finds something to enliven the ancient records, such as on the page of land grants where "Tho. Paine, Town Clerk, 1695" left a bit of unused white space, and a suc- cessor nearly a century later, mused, in a paraphrase of Ec- clesiastes: "One generation passeth away and another cometh but no man knowth-R. Knowles, TC, 1777." Less provoca- tive but more immediately practical to a town clerk (in the Jong past, at any rate) was this page which some thoughtful Eastham officer inserted in the first book of Births, Marriages and Deaths:
TO MAKE GOOD INKE
Take a quart of strong wort & three ounces of gauls, bruse them & put them in the wort & put them in an earthon pot & let them stand in the sun 14 days & shake it one day. At the 14 davs end straine it & put in two ounces & a quarter of coxore & let it stand in the sun 4 days & shake it once in 24 hours. then put in one ounce & quarter of gum dxbark & then put in a sponfull or two of onions.
A
1651
1951
III Of First Comers, Wars and Churches
Eastham's first seven citizens were notable men. Tribute to their memories has often been offered, perhaps never more fittingly than at Founders Day in 1916 when tablets to five: Smith, Doane, Higgins, Snow and Bangs were dedicated at Town Hall. Speaker of the day, it is well remembered, was Calvin Coolidge, then lieutenant governor, later to be presi- dent of the United States. Of these seven any who would pur- sue the subjects further will find many accounts in histories and genealogies. Foremost of the first comers was Thomas Prince or Prence-spelled both ways even in the earliest records-who thrice served as governor of Plymouth colony, one of the six the old colony honored with this highest post. He served in 1634, 1638 and 1657 to 1672. His farm was northwest of Town Cove and there he planted the pear tree which survived so long that it has been celebrated in prose and poetry. Although the old tree fell during a storm in 1849, a descendant was still sending up shoots within the memory of living men.
While in Nauset Prince was chosen governor the third time, and the Court permitted him, against its former custom, to continue living away from Plymouth. He returned there in 1665 and died in 1678, a just and upright man, it is writ. In the phase of the day, "he was a terror to evil-doers," and just how much of a terror is illustrated by an old story oft retold, that "a debauched fellow once cursed that gallant man, Prence" whereupon the Governor laid before the transgressor the awful- ness of his sin so forcefully that the sinner died, "with inexpres- sible torments." Eastham now has Governor Prence road in his honor.
Deacon John Doane's name usually stands beside that of Prince, he being a "Mr.," an honor accorded but few in olden
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OF FIRST COMERS, WARS AND CHURCHES
times. Deacon John was a pious farmer often honored with town and colony trust; one of the half dozen richest men in the colony; once an assistant governor, and for ten years deacon of the Plymouth church. By some accounts he died at the age of 110 years, "rocked in the cradle several of his last years," but his will indicates that he was probably only 96, still a fairly ripe age. His descendants in the Doane Family Association have placed a granite marker on his home site.
Prince came over in the Fortune, second of the Pilgrim vessels, Bangs and Snow in the Anne, the third arrival. Among Eastham's early comers were three Mayflower passengers: Con- stance Hopkins Snow, wife of Nicholas and daughter of Stephen Hopkins, her brother Giles Hopkins, and Joseph Rogers, all of whom in all probability are buried in Eastham. Next in promi- nence among the early settlers, after Governor Prince and Deacon Doane was John Freeman, son of the Edmund Freeman who was one of the first Sandwich settlers. John Freeman served town and colony in many capacities; he was assistant governor for twenty-three years; a selectman, militia officer, justice of the Court of Common Pleas, and lived to the age of 98.
It would require manv pages adequately to tell of all the first comers, their good deeds, their many marriages and numer- ous children. The will of Nicholas Snow, and inventory of his property-an interesting document listing each pot and kettle, each "paire of drawers" (three) and "paire of briches" (four), down to each of his many tools and domestic animals-alone fills eight pages, and tells much of life in old Eastham, too. But for such the reader must turn to family histories. The seven came, and soon following, many more and the new Nauset settlement grew rapidly. Heman Doane, poet, historian and
DOANE HOME SITE
This granite marker, raised by his descendants in 1869, honors one of Eastham's first comers : "Dea. John Doane-B. 1590-Here 1644-D. 1685." Behind it, in the picturesque back- ground lies Station Bay, a part of Nauset harbor. White on the horizon stand the buildings of the Nauset C. G. Station.
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
town clerk of the last century, compiled a list of those in East- ham about 1670:
Mr. Treat
John Bangs
Thos. Rogers
Mr. Freeman
Stephen Atwood
John Cole
Mr. Crosby
Richard Knowles
John Smith
Nicholas Snow
John Doane, Jr.
Josiah Cooke, Sen.
Edward Bangs
Thomas Williams
Wm. Brown
Lieut. Bangs
Henry Atkins
John Knowles
Mr. Doane
William Walker
Ephraim Doane
Daniel Cole
John Young
John Freeman
Ensign Myrick
Jona. Higgins
Thos. Freeman, Jr.
Robert Wixam
Benj. Higgins
Joshua Bangs
Giles Hopkins
Beniah Dunham
Stephen Hopkins
Ralph Smith
Richard Bishop
Josiah Cooke
Thos. Paine, Sen.
Daniel Doane
John Smalley
John Mayo
Jas. Rogers
Joseph L. Snow
Joseph Harding
Jona. Bangs
Jos. Collins
Geo. Crispe
Stephen Snow
Wm. Myrick, Jr.
Jona. Sparrow
Sam'l Smith
Jabez Snow
Mark Snow
Thos. Mulford
Samuel Paine
Job Cole
Wm. Nickerson
Thos. Paine, Jr.
Wm. Twining
Robert Eldridge
Sam'l Freeman, Jr.
Sam'l Freeman
John Rogers
This list does not name all those in Eastham, even in 1670, for some names may not be found among those formally ad- mitted as freemen, yet appear in other records. Thus, in addi- tion to those above, certainly in the town before 1700 were these family names: Bills, Linnell, Remick, Rich, Newcomb, Godfrey, Grey and Hurd.
Comparing this list with the Eastham voting roll of 1950 one may note that of forty-five names of families here nearly three centuries ago, more than half may still be found in East- ham today. More than one hundred of the town's present citizens bear names of and hark back in direct line to Nauset's first comers, and probably several hundred others have the old blood, with newer names. One generation passeth away and another cometh, as "R. Knowles, TC" wrote, and it is good to note that so much of the old stock remaineth, for so very many have gone forth from Eastham to settle in near and far places.
EASTHAM'S GREAT ROCK-Located just off Doane road, Great Rock, also called Enoch's Rock for many generations, is said to be the largest glacial boulder on Cape Cod.
What a recent author calls the Yankee Exodus began in Eastham in the early 1700s. Eastham families first helped settle the towns around them, Truro, Chatham and Harwich. Then they joined in removals to new settlements in the north- ern part of Massachusetts, now Maine, in Nova Scotia, and in the Connecticut Valley. Edwin Valentine Mitchell in "It's an Old New England Custom," writing on place names, thought it strange that East Hampton, Connecticut, was not only forty miles from Hampton, but west and not east of it. "A reading of the history of the town solved the mystery of this orphan name for me. The place was settled by people from Eastham on Cape Cod, who brought the name with them. These people
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
left the Cape to settle on the Connecticut river because they did not want their sons to go to sea; but their sons, of course, went to sea just the same."
Eastham families did not stop with helping build New England. They joined the western migrations: to New York state, Ohio, Illinois, Minnesota, the far west and indeed, all over our growing nation.
An example of an Eastham family's spreading circle be- gins with Thomas Crosby, early teacher of the church, who fol- lowed John Mayo. He removed to that part of Harwich now Brewster and became one of the founders of the church there. By and by a grandson named Thomas married Elizabeth Hop- kins, removed to Putnam County, New York, and was father of Enoch Crosby, Revolutionary war soldier and prototype of Harvey Birch, hero of James Fennimore Cooper's well remem- bered novel, The Spy. Fanny Crosby, also of the Putnam coun- ty Crosbys, became a noted hymn writer. Other Crosbys re- mained on the Cape and may yet be found in many Cape Cod towns; one in the last century designed the well known Crosby catboat in Osterville, and another was ancestor of Joseph Crosby Lincoln, novelist.
The Crosbys, Bangs, Doanes, Smiths, Freemans, Paines, Snows, Sparrows, and other old Eastham families have produced a great many interesting and some great Americans. From Thomas Paine, in several generations, came Robert Treat Paine, signer of the Declaration of Independence; and in another gen- eration, John Howard Payne, diplomat and author of Home, Sweet Home. From the Rev. Samuel Osborn was descended Winslow Homer, artist. Sometimes the old names disappear but the blood goes on through the distaff side. Thomas Prince had eight daughters and but one son, who died in England; his daughters married Freemans, Mayos, Sparrows, Snows, all in Eastham.
Coming down to more recent times, in 1859 a young man named Swift, just twenty, who lived in Sandwich and had been peddling meat from a democrat wagon, decided to seek a foot- hold as a retail meat dealer. So he opened a market in North
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OF FIRST COMERS, WARS AND CHURCHES
Eastham, in the Thumpertown neighborhood. Here he mar- ried Annie Maria Higgins, daughter of Joshua and Mariah Holmes Cobb Higgins, on January 3, 1861. After a few suc- cessful years he turned over his Eastham market to his brother Nathaniel, removed to Barnstable and later to Chicago, where he, Gustavus Franklin Swift, founded Swift and Company. Sam Nickerson, his first employee here, died but a few years ago. The Eastham-born Annie M. Swift, wife of this distinguished American business pioneer, died in 1922.
Data on all the noteworthy Eastham family descendants fills many pages in many genealogies. Searchers through biog- raphies of participants in the westward migration of Americans from the older settlements on the Atlantic seaboard will time and time again find threads of family ties reaching back to Old Eastham on Cape Cod.
OF EASTHAM AND WARS
When Nauset was only a year old one finds the first of many records showing the town's participation in our country's wars over three centuries. It was simply appointment of Jo- seph Rogers as lieutenant "to exercise theire men in armes." A decade later the town supplied and equipped three men for a troop of horse raised because of threat of war with the Dutch. Most serious conflict in the town's early years was King Philip's War, which drained all Plymouth towns of men and money. Eighteen went from Eastham and four were lost in the Reho- both ambush in this conflict which marked the last Indian threat in these parts.
Then came several expeditions against the French and In- dians to the north, over the period of 1689-1704, with many Eastham men participating. In the long spell of peace follow- ing the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 Eastham men shared in our country's first soldiers' bonus-land grants to veterans and fam- ilies of veterans of the Narraganset war. Several Eastham families joined in the settlement of Gorham, Maine, on grants to members of Captain John Gorham's Cape company-grants
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
going to twenty-one Eastham men. In 1744 war came again and Eastham men participated in new expeditions to Cape Bret- on, Nova Scotia, and Fort William Henry. Which brings us down to the Revolution.
Eastham records, like those of all Cape towns, foreshadow the coming storm. In 1773 a town committee adopted a long list of resolutions complaining of the British parliament and "its manifest violations of our rights," and closing with the ringing: "We look upon that man or society of men, who can sit still and see their rights and privileges and money daily taken from them without their consent, not worthy of the name of freemen." Two years later another set of resolves con- cerned the sale and use of tea. The language waxed even stronger, closing with, "That whosoever shall, directly or in- directly, countenance this attempt, is an enemy to his country."
The Revolution brought quotas for the Continental army, committees to provide for families of men who had enlisted, measures to fix prices and for home defense. The war im- poverished Eastham people. Like other Cape towns it simply couldn't meet all the drafts on it for supplies-one in 1780 called for 7,250 pounds of beef-and the General Court later abated some demands and some taxes. Upward of two hun- dred Eastham men served in the Continental army, on priv- ateers, or with the militia on various expeditions.
After the Revolution Eastham slowly recovered some measure of prosperity and the fishing and shellfishing industries in particular began to flourish. Then came the War of 1812. Eastham men weren't very strong for it, their feelings being those of a good many Cape Codders deprived of their livings by the embargo and blockade. But once in they made the best of it, manning privateers and, as did one Eastham man, Captain Matthew H. Mayo, showing the British navy a trick or two.
The story of Captain "Hoppy" Mayo, retold in every Cape history, is that of a brave skipper who didn't gracefully submit to confiscation of his small vessel. With Captain Winslow L. Knowles he was returning from Boston when captured by H. M. S. Spencer, Captain Richard Raggett, then on blockade
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CIVIL WAR VETERAN-Peter Higgins, one of Eastham's last G. A. R. men, who served in Co. I, 33rd Massachusetts Infantry, 1862-64.
duty in Cape Cod Bay. The British released Captain Knowles to seek ransom in Boston, but Captain Mayo they compelled to join a foray as pilot of a small schooner with three officers and twenty men. Captain Mayo piloted her with patriotic skill onto the Eastham flats and turned over all the Britishers to the militia as prisoners. Had it ended there, as the story does in
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
many accounts, it would make a happier note in our history. Our good Parson Pratt continues the account to its less heroic ending: Captain Raggett sent in his barge, demanded the prisoners' return, and not only that but an indemnity of $200 for their baggage and $1,000 to spare destruction of Eastham's salt works. The committee of safety, after mulling it over, chose the course of prudence, paid the money, returned the prisoners, and took Captain Raggett's written promise not to destroy the salt works. "Unwise and unnecessary," Parson Pratt thought, "accounted for only from the great alarm and fear which pervaded the minds of the people." It is interest- ing to note that Brewster, under like threats, paid $4,000, while Orleans refused, and saved its salt works, too.
In the Civil War Eastham furnished some seventy-seven men, the number being eleven in excess of its quota, according to contemporary records. "Its citizens and officers filled every call for men and furnished ample means for necessary expenses and bounties." Seven Eastham men lost their lives, and their names are listed on the Civil War Monument in the old Con- gregational cemetery:
Henry L. Morrison, Age 24 years Died May 18, 1864 Elkanah E. Smith, Age 27 years Died Oct. 26, 1864 Samuel Nickerson, Jr., Age 45 years Died Jan. 6, 1865 Daniel P. Hopkins, Age 23 years Died Jan. 16, 1863 Francis W. Penniman, Age 18 years Died July 8, 1864 Alvin L. Drown, Age 39 Died Sept. 12, 1864
James W. Smith, Age 23 Died April 3, 1862 "We were sacrificed but our Country lives."
"Presented by the Ladies Soldiers' Aid Society of Eastham."
The two World Wars are of so recent occurrence that de- tails are still fresh in everyone's minds. Nearly every Eastham citizen participated in some war or defense activity. Names of
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OF FIRST COMERS, WARS AND CHURCHES
those who served in the armed forces during World War I, in- scribed on a bronze tablet and boulder at Nauset road, are:
Ralph A. Chase
William Bradley Steele
Henry E. Clark
Lewis H. Collins
Bernard C. Collins
William O. Gross
Earl K. Horton
Frank B. Lincoln
Leonard J. Brewer
Warren A. Mayo
Alfred L. Gill
John F. Crosby
Freeman C. Hatch
Abbott H. Walker
Clifton Hopkins
Stanley Walker
George B. Steele
Eastham men and women who served in the armed forces during World War II are honored by a plaque dedicated No- vember 11, 1950. This list follows:
Charles H. Acorn, Jr.
Julian C. Hayes
Charles F. Atwood, Sr.
Robert W. Hayes
Charles F. Atwood, Jr.
William H. Hayes
Clyde L. Becker
Robert Hoffman
Louie A. Benner
Wendell R. Hopkins
Donald F. Brewer
Edwin W. Horton, Jr.
Howard E. Brewer
Brooks H. Hurd
James R. Brewer
Prince H. Hurd, Jr.
Robert M. Brewer
David E. Johnson
James M. Brown
George O. King
Charles N. Campbell
Joseph A. King
Cyrus H. Campbell
James P. Knowles
Edward A. D. Clark
Paul W. Knowles
Bernard C. Collins, Jr.
Raymond F. LaFleur
Robert E. Collins John B. Crosby
Irving S. Lee Roscoe R. Lee
J. Curtis Curtin
Frank B. Lincoln
Jesse E. Daniels
Elmer W. Lloyd
Robert L. Deschamps
William E. Mahoney
Lewis W. Eldredge
Carlton F. Mayo
Luther M. Eldredge
Kenneth F. Mayo
Walter C. Eldredge, Jr.
Lloyd A. Mayo
Franklin J. Emond
Alfred R. Mills
Antone P. Escobar, Jr.
Herbert L. Moore
Charles P. Escobar
Wesley B. Moore
Ralph L. D. Frost
Albert H. Nickerson
Ezekiel D. Fulcher, Jr.
Arthur C. Nickerson
Herbert D. Fulcher
Bernard A. Nickerson
Robert E. Fulcher
George S. Nickerson
Frank A. Fuller
Herbert D. Nickerson, Jr.
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EASTHAM, MASSACHUSETTS
Raymond O. Nickerson
Luther P. Smith
Richard C. Nickerson
Daniel W. Sparrow, Jr.
Vernon Nickerson
Fenton B. Sparrow
Ralph L. Ormsby
Robert W. Sparrow*
Robert W. Pearson
William B. Steele, Jr.
Barbara A. Prince
William D. Sturtevant
Martin S. Reimers
Leonard E. Tarvers
Albion F. Rich, Jr.
Warren B. Turner
George E. Rongner
Robert D. Vidler
Yngve E. Rongner
Robert C. Watson
James E. Schofield
William W. Watson
Winford L. Schofield
Ernest C. Wilson
Robert K. Scrivens
Warren L. Wilsont
George W. Sibley
Earl G. Youngren
Nicholas D. Simon
* First Lieutenant Robert W. Sparrow, pilot in the Army Air Force, lost September 12, 1944, on his eighteenth mission over enemy terri- tory.
+ Warren L. Wilson, died when his ship was torpedoed in the Carribean in April, 1942.
OF EASTHAM CHURCHES
Town histories, Thoreau commented, seem to run into a history of the church of a place, which is quite true and quite to be expected, for in most Plymouth colony towns the founders came as a church group. Eastham's were a sizeable part of the Plymouth church and, as John Cotton, a minister of the old church wrote, "the third which came forth as it were out of our bowels," the others being at Duxbury and Marshfield. Minis- ters, then settled for life, were often the best educated men of the community. Eastham's first church leader, John Mayo, who came from Barnstable in 1646 as a teaching elder, was called to Boston's second church when he left-a good indica- tion of his ability. Thomas Crosby briefly succeeded Mr. Mayo, and then came Samuel Treat in 1672-the town's first ordained minister.
Mr. Treat, son of Governor Robert Treat of Connecticut, comes down as one of the most interesting characters in East- ham's history. Devoted to the Indians, he learned their lan-
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OF FIRST COMERS, WARS AND CHURCHES
1381526
guage, preached to them and taught them, travelling from Yar- mouth to Truro in his missionary zeal. A strong Calvinist, Mr. Treat is remembered as preaching hell fire and damnation and laying it on strong. In Dr. James Freeman's striking phrase, "His voice was so loud that when speaking it could be heard at a great distance from the meetinghouse, even in the midst of the winds that howled over the plains of Nauset." When Mr. Treat died in 1716 during a snowstorm so heavy his body could not be buried for several days, his faithful Indian friends insisted on digging an arch through the snow a quarter of a mile long, we are told, and through it carried his remains on their shoulders to the grave.
The first meetinghouse, twenty feet square, was built near Town Cove soon after the first comers came. A second, for Mr. Treat, replaced it on the same site in 1676. To this a bell, and belfry said by Parson Pratt to be the first in the county, was added in 1695. This second meetinghouse was enlarged and repaired in 1700, and served to 1720, when a third meet- inghouse, on Bridge road, a little nearer the center of the town, was finished. At the same time, a meetinghouse for the south parish-later to be Orleans-was built. Of the third East- ham meetinghouse Heman Doane wrote some quotable verses beginning:
The Old South meeting-house, time-worn and gray That stood fronting east by the "King's highway, That goeth to Billingsgate"-so runs the phrase, In the quaint old records of olden days. * All gone! that old Congregational band, Save here and there one, to the Spirit Land; And their mouldering forms are sleeping near Where the old church stood so many a year.
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