USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Wilbraham > Historical address, delivered at the centennial celebration of the incorporation of the town of Wilbraham, June 15, 1863 > Part 2
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kindled their evening fires by these springs, and, as they smoked their pipe, beheld the western sky lighting up when the sun went down, as if with the smile of the Great Spirit and of the heroes who had fallen in battle, and buried their kindred under these trees, she lived soli- tary, the curiosity of the early settlers, harmless, quiet, meditative, seldom entering any dwelling, and providing for her own wants. At last even she disappeared. Of the manner of her death, or of her burial-place, no man knoweth. She passed away, as a shadow of the van- ished race, and joined the company and pastime of her fathers, " the hunter and the deer a shade," in the land of the sunset, beyond the western hills which she had so often seen empurpled at eventide.
There was nothing to hinder the enterprising from entering in and taking possession of the land; and in the summer of 1730, Nathaniel Hitchcock came out from Springfield Street, and cleared and broke up two acres of ground, and erected a log hut where the house of Mr. James Merrick, the great grandson of the first minister, now stands. After sowing his two aeres with wheat, Hitchcock returned to Springfield Street to spend the winter and make the few preparations which were necessary to remove his young wife, whom he had married that year, to his hut by the " Mountains," in the spring. In May, 1731, one hundred and thirty-two years ago, he came out with his wife to his narrow field and low hut, and resided here a full year, with no neigh- bor nearer than Springfield Street. Nine miles away,
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he planted his corn, he gathered his wheat, he mowed his grass, dried and stacked his hay, husked and stored his corn under the roof of his cabin ; and when the long, dark, stormy winter evenings came, he was solaced with the music of his wife's song, and the voice of his child, and the crackling and roaring of the fire in his great open fireplace, in the corners of which, in later days, the children were delighted to sit and gaze up through the huge chimney at the sparkling stars.
At last the spring opened, and not only the robins . and the bluebirds returned, but what was better for him and for Hannah, his wife, Noah Alvord came and settled near him, on the place where Mr. Lorenzo Kibbe now resides. Sweet counsel did these two neighbors take respecting the field to be cleared, to be planted, to be sown; and often did Hitchcock, that summer, take his axe and go over to his Neighbor Alvord's to work by his side, softening the hardness of the labor by the pleasure of society. And you might have seen Alvord, of an early morning, with his hoe in hand, going over to make Hitchcock's long day's work shorter by his helpfulness. Nor was there any rivalry between the two wives, ex- cept to most lovingly and abundantly render all needed service to each other.
The report of the land was good; and the next year, 1733, came Daniel Warner, and settled where the Widow Brainard Brewer now resides, near both Hitch- cock and Alvord. In 1734, the next year, Mr. Nathan- iel Warriner, afterwards a prominent citizen, the donor
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of the ministry and school-fund, located himself where Mrs. Gale and Mrs. Mears now reside. Of these four earliest settlers no descendant remains in town. Na- thaniel Warriner had no children. Of Noah Alvord's four children, none had children. And the descendants of Hitchcock and Warner all left the town years ago.
It is possible that some other settlers may have come in before 1734. Moses Burt, grandfather of our oldest vice-president, Deacon Moses Burt, now hale in his ninety-first year, and thrice welcome to our festivities, an industrious weaver and reed-maker, settled on the Burt Farm, perhaps as early as 1733, for in that year the deed of his farm, given by Mary Day, is dated. Then Samuel Warner settled on Stony Hill ; Samuel Stebbins on the mountain not far from Mr. Richards's ; David Merrick built his house where Mr. John M. Mer- rick resides; Jolin Jones settled on Mr. Buell's place ; Abel Bliss, great grandfather of Mr. John Wesley Bliss, on the Bliss Farm ; Daniel Lamb, on the Bay Road, west of Jenksville ; Thomas Merrick, father of the young man bitten by a rattlesnake, immortalized in song, on Mr. Cross's Farm; David Warriner on the Academy lot; Isaac Brewer on Edwin Brewer's place ; David Chapin and Moses Bartlett over and on the mountain; and Nathaniel Bliss near Samuel Stebbins. But the time would fail me to name all those, few though they were, who settled in the town before 1741, or during the first ten years, - the first period of our history.
In May, 1740, there are twenty-six names attached
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to the petition for incorporation as a separate precinct. All these are from what is now called the North Parish. I find no evidence that there were any settlers within the limits of the present South Parish before 1741. Of these petitioners, two were not landholders, and soon removed, so that there were but twenty-four, - some say but twenty-two, - who paid taxes.
Few and scattered as the settlers were, they were not indifferent to the education of their children. As early as 1737 I find that the town of Springfield appropri- ated three pounds for the support of a school in the " outward commons on the east side." There were at this time, as nearly as I can ascertain, but eleven fami- lies. The same amount was appropriated the following year. In 1739, the sum was increased to four pounds ; and in 1740, two pounds more were added, making six pounds for the education of these children, our grand- fathers. The Testament was the text-book in schools, as well as the oracle in the church. Dilworth's spelling- book was their guide in spelling. Of geography noth- ing was taught; of arithmetic but little. Writing re- ceived more attention. The means of education were very scant at the best, and the instruction, given in the houses of the different families in turn, was prob- ably very imperfect.
During this first period, to Jan. 1. 1741, there were thirty-eight children born, and but three persons died ; not one of them was buried in the town. Widow Eliza- beth Cockril, who had come from Boston to reside with
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a relative, and who died April 26, 1741, was the " first person yt was Bured in ye town."
Comfort Warner, daughter of Daniel Warner and Jerusha Warner, his wife, was the first child born in the "outward commons on the east side of the Great River," March 15, 1734. The first death was that of "David Jones, son of David Jones, and Hannah Jones, his wife, August 19th, 1736."
These pioneers were hardy and industrious, and pros- perity, such as they sought, as bounteous as they ex- pected, was their reward; and eminently was fulfilled to every householder the promise of the Psahnist, "Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house ; thy children like olive-plants round about thy table." 1
Such was the condition of the settlement in the " out- ward commons" at the close of ten years. Twenty-four families, or twenty-six, scattered over an area of four miles long and two miles broad, possessing only the barest comforts of life, include all the population. Most of their houses, it is true, were framed, the saw- mill at Sixteen Acres supplying lumber, but they were poorly finished, scantily glazed, and meagrely fur-
nished, and rarely even partially plastered. Their fields were still narrow, and but insecurely fenced. The bears and squirrels shared their scant harvest. The penurious soil did not make large returns, at best, for their labor. They were far from store and 1 Appendix B.
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mill. They had no roads for wheel-carriages, nor any conveyances of this kind, even if there had been roads. From the sides of the mountain, the friendly smokes of the settlers on the banks of the "Great River" could be seen rising above the trees. Between, there spread out an unbroken forest, swamp and meadow, save where a pond interrupted the continuity, whose placid waters mirrored the heavens. They were religious men and women; and the way was long and difficult to the first parish meeting-house. The sun smote them in summer, snows blocked their path in winter. When the Sunday morning came, Daniel Lamb could comfortably make his way along the Bay Road to the sanctuary. But Hitchcock and Bliss and Warriner and Merrick, and the rest, some on horseback, their wives on their pillions behind, and the baby on the pommel before, and some on foot, started in the early morning for the meeting-house, nine miles away, by way of Pole Bridge Brook, over Stony Hill, striking the Usquaick, or Mill River, at Sixteen Acres, and en- tering the Bay Road near Goose Pond. The young men and maidens, for reasons easily divined, preferred to walk even when there was no necessity ; and it is re- ported, not slanderously it is to be presumed, that the way seemed all too short to Zion, and all the more lovely because so few went up to her solemn feasts. But the elders wearied of the way; the briers were sharp, the swamps were miry, the fords were insecure, the storms were drenching. Their souls longed for the
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courts of the Lord, their hearts and their flesh cried out for the living God. They had enjoyed the blessing of the preached word in their own homes on a few occa- sions, and it was pleasant to their souls. They cher- ished tenderly, yet timidly, their desire to establish the " means of grace " in their settlement. They talked over the subject in their families, and with each other in the field and by the way. They became courageous by speech, and gained assurance by intercourse. 'At last, Hitchcock and Warriner and Bliss and Burt and Brewer and Stebbins, and the rest, met, we may suppose, at Mer- rick's house, in the midst of winter, and talked the matter over, before the great fireplace. They are few; they are poor ; they are not famous. But they loved the sanctuary and the ordinances of religion. They have faith in endeavor. They resolve to try the heart of the brethren in the first parish, Springfield Street, and of Longmeadow, incorporated as a precinct, in 1713, and see if they would not consent to their being set off as a separate precinct, and aid their petition to the pro- vincial government to that end, so that there may no longer be a " dearth of the word of the Lord " on the " Mountains."
Their petition is favorably received by Longmeadow, and it is voted, March 10, 1740, that " the outward commons of Springfield, be set off for the benefit of the gospel ministry." The first precinct passed a similar vote March 21.
There is now no lion in the way, and these modest
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" outward commoners" take courage, draw up a paper empowering their agents, and certifying to their author- ity and responsibility, and send up their petition, signed in their behalf by Thomas Merrick, 2d, and Abel Bliss, to the provincial governor and council, which should be given in full in their own words :--
"To his Excellency Jonathan Belcher Esq Captain General and Governour in Chief in and over His Majes- tys Province of the Massachusetts Bay To the hon- oble His Majestys Council and House of Representa- tives in General Court assembled at Boston May A D 1740.
" The Petition of Abel Bliss and Thomas Mirick Sec- ond for themselves and the rest of the Inhabitants set- tled at the mountains So called at the east side of the great river in Springfield on the land called the Outward Commons, being the second and third divisions of said Commons
" Humbly Sheweth that your Pet's live nine miles from the said Town of Springfield, which distance makes it very inconvenient for them to attend the Publick Worship of God especially, in the winter season, that they cant attend the Service and Duties of Gods House as they ought, by reason of the badness of the weather. which makes the roads very bad and renders them al- most impossible to travel in, -
" That the land lying in the Second and Third Divi- sions of the Sd outward commons being in length north and South eight miles and east and west four miles are
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very convenient and Commodious for a Precinct which your pet's are very desirous of, for the building of a meeting house for the Public worship of God in the said Precinct that so they may attend the Dutys and Service of God's House seasonably and constantly as they ought to do.
"And your Pet's would suggest to your Excellency and Honours That the first Parish and Longmeadow Parish in Sª Springfield whereto they belong voted their consent that your Pet's should be set off a sepa- rate Precinct from the said Parishes.
" And therefore your Pet's humbly pray that your Ex- cellency and Honours would be pleased to set them off and also to set off all those Lands which lye in the Sec- ond and Third Division of the said outward Commons being in length north and south eight miles, and east and west four miles a Separate Precinct, and grant unto them all such powers and libertys priviledges and Im- munitys as other Precincts have and enjoy with and under such restrictions and limitations as your Excel- lency and Honours shall deem meet; and that all the lands lying within the limits aforesaid may be taxed further to enable your Pet's to settle a minister &c for such term of time, and at such rate as your Excellency and Honours shall think proper.
"And your Pet's (as in Duty bound) shall ever pray "THOMAS MIRICK, 2ª
" ABEL BLISS."
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Thus pathetically and hopefully did they send up their prayer to those in authority.
Their petition was received by the House of Repre- sentatives, June 26, 1740, and it was " Ordered that the petitioners serve the non-resident proprietors of land with a copy of this Petition, by posting the same at the town-house in Springfield, and by inserting it in one of the Public Newspapers, that they may show cause (if any they have) on the first Tuesday of the next session of this Court, why the Prayer thereof should not be granted." It was sent up to the council for concur- rence the same day ; and on the next day, June 27, the petition was read and the "Order" concurred in, and consented to, by the governor.
The petition was taken up by the House at the next session, January 2, 1741, "and it appearing that the non-resident Proprietors have been sufficiently notified, but no answer given in, Ordered that the Prayers of the Petition be so far granted as that the Petitioners To- gether with all the lands petitioned for lying southward of the River called Chicuepe River runing Easterly and Westerly through the said Second Division of said Com- mons be erected into a Separate and distinct Precinct and that they be vested with all the Powers liberties Privilidges and immunities as other Precincts hold and Enjoy and that all the lands Petitioned lying Southward of the River as aforesaid be subjected to a tax of two pence old tenor Bills p" acre pr annum for the space of Four years Next Coming the money arising thereby to
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be applyed for the building of a Meeting house Settle- ment and support of the Ministry among them." This " Order " was sent up to the council for concurrence on the same day. January 5, 1741, the council concurred. On the next day, January 6, it was consented to by Jonathan Belcher, Governor, and the " Outward Com- mons on the East Side of the Great River," or " Moun- tanes of Springfield," became the " fourth precinct of Springfield."
There was joy in those households when the success of their petition was known, and more than one man called upon his neighbor to bless the Lord for his kind- ness to them. The axe was plied more vigorously, and the winter fires burned more cheerily because the ark of the Lord was to be set up among them.1
II. We now enter upon the second period of our his- tory. The precinct is incorporated, and no time is lost in entering upon the new and difficult work before the incorporators. A petition was sent, January 25, 1741, nineteen days only after the act of incorporation was passed, for a warrant to call a precinct meeting. And the first warrant, for that purpose, was issued February 13, 1741, one month and seven days after the act of incorporation was "consented to," by "Wm. Pynchon, Esq., one of his Majastes Justeses of the Peace for Hampshire County," to Mr. Nathaniel Warriner, " upon application made by Nathaniel Bliss, 2d, Sam'l Stebbins,
1 Appendix C.
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Junr., Samuel Warner, 2d, Noah Alvard and Nathaniel Warriner," requiring him "to Notifie the Freeholders and other inhabitants of said Precinct Quallified to voat in town affairs, that they meet and assemble together att the Dwelling House of David Mirick in said Precinct on the second Thursday [the 12th day] of March next att one a clock afternoon."
The meeting was held at the time and place specified, and was organized by the choice of " William Pynchon. Esq., Moderator. David Mirick was chosen Clerk and sworn. Thomas Mirick, 2d, Isaac Brewer, Nathaniel Warriner, Committee of the Precinct for the year en- suing. Isaac Brewer, Treasurer, sworn ; David Mirick, Thomas Mirick, 2d, Samuel Stebbins, chosen Assessors, sworn. Nathaniel Warriner, chosen Collector, sworn." Thus the precinct was organized, and it is voted, that " the annual meeting for the choice of precinet officers shall be ye second Wednesday of March annually."
Four very difficult and important undertakings are to test the skill, ability and patience of the members of the precinct : - The choice and settlement of a minister, the location and erection of a meeting-house. Six dif- ferent meetings are held before the first day of June. in about two months, to agree upon a minister and ar- range his settlement and salary; for it was customary at that time to pay a considerable sum to a minister, at the commencement of his ministry, called a " settlement," in addition to his annual salary. At the first meeting, held at the dwelling-house of Isaac Brewer, March 25, 1741,
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called, among other things, to see "wheather they will give the worthy Mr. Noah Mirick a call in order to settle in the work of the ministry in case they have the advice of the neighboring ministers," they chose Joseph Wright and Daniel Warner a committee " to make application to three neighboring ministers in behalf of said precinct for advice who to settle in the work of the ministry," and pending the procurement of this advice they voted " to hier Mr. Noah Mirick to Preach the word of God to them three Sabbaths beginning the first Sabbath in April next ensuing." Mr. Merrick had been preaching for them previously as appears from subsequent votes, and had preached in all twenty Sundays before his or- dination. They also direct their committee to " further pursue and execute a Deed that is Given of the Land called the Overplus Land given to the first settled Orthodox minister of this Precinct." This overplus land, it will be remembered, consisted of two lots four miles long from east to west, the one on the south side of the second Division being eighty-two rods wide, and the only one probably which was deeded to the first minister, the one on the south side of the third Division being sixty rods wide. This land was owned by the heirs of the one hundred and twenty-five original pro- prietors. Phineas Chapin and Samuel Warner, the committee, have no small labor committed to them to hunt up these heirs and obtain their signatures to the deed of conveyance. On the 17th of April, without waiting for the "advice of three neighboring ministers,"
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they "unanimously voated a Call or Desier that the Wor- thy Mr. Noah Mirick should settle with" them " in the work of the Ministry; chose Aaron Stebbins to assist Warner and Chapin in getting More Signers to a Deed of the overplus Land and get the same acknolidged;" and to " hier Mr. Mirick Four Sabbaths more, if he Give encouragement to settle." The meeting was adjourned to the "Twenty-fourth of this instant, April ;" and at the adjourned meeting it would seem that they had re- ceived such " encouragement " from " worthy Mr. Mirick that he would settle," as to justify them in choosing " five men as a Committee to State, Regulate and Draw up a scheem Relating to the Encouragement of Mr. Mirick's settling with them in the work of the ministry." The importance of securing a deed of the "Overplus Land " is indicated by their voting that their committee on that subject " shall hier a Justice Peace to take acknowledg- ments of the same att the Charge of the Precinct." They then adjourn to the "Eleventh Day of May next." At this May meeting the committee chosen to " Regulate a salary to ofer to Mr. Mirick " make their report. They state that they have taken the matter into serious con- sideration, and that they find "the money or Coin in this Province is so variable and uncertain as to its value in Proportion with other commodaties that they can't think it a medium whereby the salary can be settled or assertained with any safety or security either to the Minister or People." "Wherefore," they continue, " we have considered the value or Currant Market Price of
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the several Commodaties hearafter mentioned, viz : Indian Corn att 6s. per booshel ; Wheat, 11s. per boosh- el; Rie, Ss. 6d. per booshel; Barley, Ss. per booshel ; Oats, 4s. per booshel ; Flax, from ye swingle, 1s. 6d. per pound ; Beaf, 5d. per pound; Pork, Sd. per pound." They further recommend " that Mr. Mirick be Elowed either money for his salary Bills or other Commodaties or Considerations Equal to One Hundred Pound a year for the first four years of his being settled and after the fourth year to Rise five Pounds a year till his sallary amount to one Hundred and forty Pound per annum in the Currancy above said so long as he continue to be their minister." They further recommend that a com- mittee shall annually agree with the minister upon price, " before the meeting for Granting Precinct Charges," so that the sum shall be Equal in value as above specified, and " that the whole of the salary be paid in by the Last Day of March annually." They also suggest " that for his further encouragement he have the improvement of that part of the Ministry Land that will fall to the Ministry of this Precinct." They also estimate, "by a moderate computation," that the "Overplus Land," of which they are obtaining a deed for the minister, is " worth three Hundred Pounds," which is considered, as it was, a generous settlement. They conclude their re- port in the following words: "and for the further en- couragement of Mr. Mirick's settling with us, it is Pro- posed that we Cut and Boat of a suficient Quantity of Rainging Timber for a Dweling House for him and con-
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vey the same to the Place where he shall Determine to Erect said Building."
Such is the offer which these twenty-two or twenty- four landholders make to the "worthy Mr. Mirick to settle " with them in the ministry. The meeting " voat- ed that the same be Excepted, Granted and Elowed in the value maner and Proportion, as is expressed and set forth in the Report." They choose a committee to " wait upon Mr. Noah Mirick with a Copy of said Report and the aforesaid voat, for his Answer," and adjourn to the "Eighteenth Day " of the month, seven days, to give Mr. Merrick time to consider the conditions and prepare his answer.
To us of the present day, when we consider the smallness of the number and the poorness of the possessions of the members of the precinct, the salary and settlement seem generous. Mr. Merrick evidently had some of the wisdom of the children of this world, as well as that of the children of light. At any rate, at the adjourned meeting, " it was considered that the offers for the encouragement of Mr. Noah Mirick's set- tling with us as our minister were not sufficient." This is certainly very modestly stated, and relieves Mr. Merrick from all suspicion of having offensively pressed a bargain of his solicitous hearers. It is very probable that he had hinted some additional favors which they might render him, which, while they would cost little but labor, would be to him as acceptable as gold, for they vote " to provide the timber for a Dwel-
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ing House for said Mr. Mirick, which was not included in the former voat ;" also to " Hue, frame, and Raise said building, for said Mr. Mirick." Meanwhile Joseph Wright and Daniel Warner, who were chosen a com- mittee to take the advice of three neighboring min- isters, have made their weary journey through the woods to South Hadley, obtained the opinions of three ministers there assembled, and have safely returned with the advice of Samuel Allis, James Bridgham, and Edward Billings, which is in the following words : " These may signifye that upon Application made to us by a Committee from a Place called Springfield Mountains, of their choice of Mr. Noah Mirick for their minister, that we approve of their Choice, and Heartily Commend him and them to the Divine Blessing." The advice is acceptable, of course, for these men of " a Place called Springfield Mountains" had already strained a point to make the salary and settlement satisfactory to the minister.
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