History of Barnstable County, Massachusetts, 1620-1890, Part 15

Author: Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: New York : Blake
Number of Pages: 1292

USA > Massachusetts > Barnstable County > History of Barnstable County, Massachusetts, 1620-1890 > Part 15

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From Hyannis, Centreville, and other shore villages to Sandwich, Dea. James Marchant ran three trips per week, from 1836 to 1840. He was followed successively by Eli Hinckley, Gorham F. Crosby and

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HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

John F. Cornish. From Hyannis to Nantucket, from 1825 to 1830, the mails were carried in a packet by Freeman Matthews. There- after, for many years, until 1872, the mails and passengers were taken by sailing vessels and steamer to Nantucket, the steamers being with- drawn upon the opening of Woods Holl railroad.

Those veteran whips Nickerson and Howes continued to serve the Chatham public until the opening of the railroad to that town, and for nearly a year after the road was in full operation the old contract- ors continued to run the mail carriage. With the retirement of "Whit" and "Sim," by which names everybody knew these contract- ors, the last of the stages on Cape Cod were withdrawn, for the car- riages which transport mails and passengers to and from Cotuit, Os- terville and Centreville via West Barnstable, and Mashpee and vicinity via Sandwich, do not resemble the old-time stages of the fathers, such as the elders of this generation knew when they were girls and boys.

The short lines between towns and from the central villages to smaller ones, have frequently been found too minute for this general chapter. These postal routes and mail lines will therefore be men- tioned in the chapters devoted to the towns where the routes were established and run.

Previous to the opening of the Woods Holl road, the Boston mails were carried for many years by David Dimmock, of Pocasset, and afterward by William Hewins, of Falmouth, the terminus of the line after the opening of the Cape Cod railroad being at Monument (now Bourne). A ferry was established from Falmouth to the Vineyard, running daily, wind and weather permitting, during the twenty years preceding the establishment of railroad and steamboat communica- tions. The first grant was given a century and a half ago, to Joseph Parker and others, and it was continued by their successors until quite recent times.

After the construction of the Woods Holl branch, the only remain- ing stages were the Chatham line, supplying that town and the inter- mediate villages to Harwich, with their mails and passenger trans- portation, and the Mashpee route, by which the villages of Mashpee, South Sandwich and Greenville are supplied.

RAILROAD LINES .- Railroad communication to the Cape was opened in 1848, by the extension of the line between Boston and Middleboro, under the charter granted to the Cape Cod Branch Rail- road Company, from Middleboro to Sandwich, a distance of twenty- seven miles. The first board of directors of this line was constituted as follows: Richard Borden, Joshua B. Tobey, Philander Washburn, P. G. Seabury, Nahum Stetson, Southworth Shaw, T. G. Coggshall, Howard Perry, Clark Hoxie. Richard Borden was the first presi-

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dent, and Southworth Shaw, clerk. The road was extended to Hy- annis in 1854; the first passenger train commenced running May 19th of that year. This extension was eighteen miles long and, including the wharf at Hyannis and the equipments of the road, the cost of the entire extension from Middleboro to Hyannis was $824,057.99. The Cape Cod Central railroad was opened from Yarmouth to Orleans, a distance of 1S2 miles, December 6. 1865. The first directors of this road were: Prince S. Crowell, Joseph Cummings, Reuben Nickerson, Joseph K. Baker, Truman Doane, Chester Snow, Elisha Bangs, Ben- jamin Freeman and Freeman Cobb. Prince S. Crowell was president, and Jonathan Young, clerk and treasurer. The next extension of this road was to Wellfleet, twelve miles farther, December 28, 1870, and from thence to Provincetown, fourteen additional miles, July 22, 1873. The "openings" of these sections were celebrated with great demonstrations of rejoicing in the several towns to which they were extended, as placing the communities of the Cape in more direct re- lations to the outside world.

The consolidation of the Cape Cod branch and the Cape Cod Cen- tral roads, in 1868, before the final extension to Provincetown, under the name of the Cape Cod Railroad Company, was followed, in 1872, by the union of the latter company with the Old Colony railroad- the entire line, from Middleboro to Provincetown being known as the Cape Cod division. The Woods Holl branch, seventeen miles in length, between Buzzards bay and Woods Holl, was opened to travel July 18, 1872. A branch line of seven miles, from Harwich to Chat- ham, opened October, 1887, completes the railroad system of the county. The steam cars now penetrate every town of the fifteen, ex- cept Mashpee, giving our citizens two opportunities each day to go to and return from Boston, during the entire year, and in some seasons communications are maintained over portions of this division three times each way daily. The first superintendent of the Cape Cod branch was Sylvanus Bourne, of Wareham. He was succeeded by Ephraim N. Winslow, with headquarters at Hyannis. Mr. Winslow was succeeded by the present incumbent, Charles H. Nye, as assistant superintendent of this division, who commenced service on the road as conductor in 1857. Previous to that time, Mr. Nye had been iden- tified with the beginning of the enterprise, having canvassed for subscriptions of stock for the road as early as 1847-8, and actually collecting the first money paid for subscriptions in the county. There is no one living so intimately connected with the road from its inception to the present time as Mr. Nye.

As the supplement to the mail postal arrangements, and as the lastest feature in our postal system, came the postal car service, which was introduced about the year 1855. Cyrus Hicks of Boston was the

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HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

first postal clerk and the only one at first, leaving Boston in the morn- ing for Hyannis and returning in the afternoon. One mail pouch was sufficient for the letters, and a limited number of pouches for the newspaper mail, where now from eighty to 120 per day are required for the newspaper mail alone. The service now consists of eight rail- way postal clerks, two running entirely through each way between Boston and Wellfleet on both the trains, and receiving and distribut- ing the mails at every post office on the line and its connections. The following are the clerks now in service on this route: John W. Allen, Joseph M. White, William W. Johnson, Henry O. Cole, Frank M. Swift, George A. Roundy, S. Alexander Hinckley, T. Winthrop Swift.

EXPRESS LINES .- When the railroad was extended to Sandwich in 1848, the Cape Cod Express was started by Messrs. Witherell & Boy- den, proprietors. Mr. Witherell was thrown from a carriage and died soon after from injuries received, when Nathaniel B. Burt formed a partnership with Mr. Boyden, which continued until the death of the former. In 1861, Rufus Smith, who had established a stage line be- tween Yarmouth and Chatham, took the mails and express, which he continued to transport until 1866, when the road was extended to Or- leans, and Mr. Smith had an express privilege on the cars for his mails, and furnished teams and stages for all the stations for passen- gers, mails and express. In 1868, the Central having been purchased by the Cape Cod Branch Railroad Company, the express business was sold to Boyden, Burt and Smith, in equal parts. In July, 1877, the New York & Boston Despatch Express Company were permitted to cover the line, and after two and one-half years of competition, the two concerns were united and are known as New York & Boston Despatch and Cape Cod Express Company.

MAGNETIC TELEGRAPHS, CABLES, ETC .- Telegraphic communica- tion between the Cape and Boston was established in 1855. Two companies were competitors for the privilege of occupying the field, which before had been vacant. The Boston & Cape Cod Marine Telegraph Company got a few weeks ahead in its construction, and on September 28, 1855, the Yarmouth Register was enabled to publish the news of the fall of Sevastopol, by telegraphic intelligence received the night previous-a fact which was regarded by its readers with wonder and incredulity. During the ensuing fall the line was ex- tended to Chatham and Provincetown. The rival line, called the Cape Cop Telegraph Company, was more especially under New York aus- pices, and the patronage of the Associated Press. The first named company, which had been operated by an association, was incorpor- ated in April, 1856, and was organized at Barnstable June 24th of that year. George Marston was the first president, Charles F. Swift, clerk and treasurer, and John T. Smith, of Boston, superintendent. The

TRAVEL AND TRANSPORTATION. 129

two telegraph lines were in a year or two consolidated, and this com- pany was afterward absorbed by the all-devouring Western Union Telegraph Company.

A telegraphic cable was early in 1856 extended from Nobsque point, in Falmouth, to Gay Head, a distance of 3} miles. August 18, 1856, a cable fourteen miles long was laid from Monomoy to Great point, on Nantucket. Communication was transmitted to and from Nantucket for a day or two, but the cable was either cut or broken by the force of the channel, and after a short time abandoned. In 1858. Samuel C. Bishop, a gutta percha goods manufacturer, who made the last named cable, laid another across Muskeget channel, and estab- lished telegraphic communications between Edgartown and Nantucket. There were frequent obstructions, caused sometimes by imperfect in- sulation, but oftener by vessels' anchors fouling with the cables, and the attempts of Mr. Bishop were abandoned in 1861. Since that time several abortive attempts to maintain cable communications with the islands have been made by the existing telegraph companies, but, from the causes heretofore mentioned, have been unsuccessful. Since 1887, congress having in that year made an appropriation to maintain a cable from Woods Holl to Nantucket via the Vineyard, as an auxili- ary of the life-saving service, and also permitting the receipt and transmission of commercial messages, communication has, with occa- sional interruptions, been maintained to the present time.

Telephone service to the Cape was established in 1882, when aline was constructed and offices opened in West Barnstable, Osterville, Hyannis, Cotuit, and Marston's Mills. The New Bedford system, as it is called, was connected with the Cape the following year (1883), cov- ering the territory above described, and also connecting with Sand- wich, Yarmouth, Dennis, Harwich, Harwich Port, South Chatham, Chatham, Brewster, Orleans. Eastham, North Eastham, Wellfleet, Truro, South and North Truro. Beach Point and Provincetown. M. E. Hatch of New Bedford is the general manager.

CHAPTER IX.

INDUSTRIAL RESOURCES.

The Fisheries .- Coasting .- Shipbuilding .- Manufacturing .- Saltmaking .- Agriculture. -Cranberry Culture .- Summer Resorts .- Yachting.

A N important part of the history of any people is the resources upon which their sustenance has depended and from which their wealth may be derived. The reader already understands that it was by hardy, practical Englishmen that this county was, for the most part, first settled. Whatever may have been their taste, or their training, the insular position of the place they adopted as their home in the New World, rendered maritime pursuits both natural and necessary. They knew before coming here that the Cape possessed great fertility, and that agriculture might be successfully undertaken; but when the home, the garden, and the meadow had been provided. they naturally turned their attention to those vast and exhaustless food supplies with which the surrounding waters so richly abounded. Thus we find them in the first generations daring the perils of the ocean which lay so invitingly around them, and which promised so rich a reward to any who would undertake its conquest. The build- ing of vessels must needs receive their early attention, and to this the forests were in a large measure sacrificed; and almost in proportion as the forests disappeared the productiveness of much of the lands de- creased.

As their intercourse with the Dutch along the Hudson and Long Island sound became more thoroughly established, the tendency was to give more of their attention here to the various branches of fishing; and by an exchange of products they found it less necessary to cultivate the unfriendly soil. Thus the trend of affairs in the county was steadily toward those maritime pursuits which for more than two centuries since have been the characteristic and the pride of Cape Cod. The love of adventure is hereditary, and if the fathers caught codfish at the Grand banks, the sons were satisfied with nothing less than taking whales in the Pacific. And as generation succeeded generation their energy and enterprise increased until a portion of the life of nearly every able-bodied man was passed upon the sea.

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INDUSTRIAL RESOURCES.

There were probably then no people in the New World whose em- ployments were more varied, or whose resources were more widely diversified than were those of the people who for the first century occupied this Cape. Their fields gave liberal reward for their toil, and on every hand were the still more productive waters of the sea. Thus all those pursuits, which may be generally classed as fishing, have been a perpetual, although a varying, fountain of wealth. The superior advantages for fishing, which Provincetown offered in 1620, were observed by the Pilgrims, and the practical whalemen among them expressed their belief that with proper facilities they, from the taking of whales alone, could have made a most profitable return for the whole voyage. As early as 1666 the Plymouth court imposed upon the Cape Cod fisheries a duty, for revenue only, with which a public school was to be established, and with the proceeds of stranded whales they oiled the machinery of church and state.

The codfishing on North American coasts received the attention of Europe almost immediately after the Cabots' explorations. The abundance of this fish in the immediate vicinity of the Cape has been noticed, and is forever recorded in the name which the peninsula bears. In 1622 the Plymouth Company complained to the king, of thirty-seven English ships which had made successful fishing voyages to the New England coast, whereupon all fishing, or Indian trading, was prohibited on these shores except by license from the council of Plymouth. The right to control this industry gave to the colony, first, franchises for which they received £1,800 from the merchant adventurers, and later those royalties and revenues, the collection of which in the various towns the reader will hereafter notice.

For a century and a half this branch of fishing grew in importance and the extent of waters visited by the Cape fishermen included the Bay of Fundy, the banks of Newfoundland, and the surrounding straits. An idea of the extent to which the people of this country de- pended upon this resource may appear from the following figures, showing the annual average of five towns for the ten years preceding the revolution. These figures are from Macgregor's tables, a standard English authority: Chatham had thirty vessels of thirty tons each en- gaged in the business and employed 240 men, taking 12,000 quintals. Provincetown had four vessels of forty tons each, employing thirty- two men, who took 16,000 quintals. Eighty men with ten vessels of forty tons each, sailing from Truro, took 4,000 quintals. Wellfleet had three vessels operated by twenty-one men who secured 900 quint- als. Yarmouth had thirty vessels of thirty tons each, in which 180 men secured 9,000 quintals.

When the colonists in 1776 appealed to the uncertain arbitrament of war, these maritime interests suffered most, but so promptly did they

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HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

resume their peaceable pursuits after the declaration of peace that the averages of the four years, including and preceding 1790, are equal to the yearly average for the decade preceding the war. Provincetown had greatly increased her vessels and tonnage, sending out eleven, with an average of fifty tons, in which eighty-eight men secured S,200 quintals of cod annually.

The business of the cod fishermen has been a permanent and gen- erally a profitable one, and their product has long been one of the staple food-supplies of the world. Off every shore of the Cape more or less are caught, but the greater supply is to the north and east. The records of the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that in the census year 1837 there were taken 134,658 quintals of cod by the fishermen of Barnstable county. Of these Provincetown caught 51.400 quintals; Orleans, 20,000; Truro, 16,520; Chatham, 15,500; Harwich, 10,000; Den- nis, 9,141; Yarmouth, 4,300; Wellfleet, 3,100; Sandwich, 2,100; Eastham, 1,200; Brewster, 800; and Barnstable, the least, 267 quintals.

In 1845 Provincetown secured 20,000 quintals; Harwich, 14,200; Dennis, 11,150; Chatham, 7,600; Truro, 6,250; Yarmouth, 6,195; Orleans, 3,500; Brewster, 2,400; Eastham and Wellfleet, each 2,000; and Fal- mouth, 800 quintals.

The next decade showed Provincetown catching 79,000 quintals annually; with Chatham next in order, taking 15,000; Wellfleet, 8,528; Barnstable, 8,225; Harwich, 6,300; Yarmouth, 4,400; Orleans, 4,265: Dennis, 1,200; Eastham, 300; and Falmouth, 250 quintals.

In the census year 1865 Provincetown reported a catch of 65,411 quintals, followed by Chatham, with 25,361; Harwich, 20,938; Dennis, 7,769; Barnstable, 1,938; Orleans, 1,350; Wellfleet, 1,200: Truro, 670; Yarmouth, 500; and Eastham, 130 quintals.

In 1875 the Provincetown fleet reported for the census year 29,936 quintals; Chatham, 16,773; and Yarmouth, 62 quintals.

While other branches of fishing are common to all the towns of the county, the cod fishing is more extensively carried on from Province- town. In 1887 the Provincetown fleet took 120,000 quintals; in 18SS fifty-seven vessels, employing nine hundred men, secured 90,000 quint- als; and the season of 1889 yielded but 50,000 quintals to the forty- nine vessels and the eight hundred men employed. These latter fig- ures indicate the least prosperous season which the fleet has had in twenty years. In the early days of the business a crew consisted of six or eight men, but larger vessels were found to be better, and dur- ing the recent years schooners with twenty-five men each are more generally in use. Their season at the Grand banks is usually from April to September, and it has been expected that during this period the fleet would secure two hundred quintals of fish for each man em- ployed.

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INDUSTRIAL RESOURCES.

According to the state census of 1885, the cod fleets from Barn- stable county took 18,134,539 pounds of fish. Provincetown took 16,801,060; Chatham, 755,009: Harwich, 415,160; Truro, 112,050; Or- leans, 28,560; Dennis, 20,700; and Barnstable, 2,000 pounds.

The first people who pursued the whale fishery as a regular busi- ness were the Biscayans, who carried it on with success from the twelfth to the fourteenth century; although the Norwegians had taken whales cast on the Shetland and Orkney coasts at a much earlier period. The northern whale fishery was opened up by the Dutch and English after their voyages of discovery, and as early as 1680 the Dutch whale fishery reached its most prosperous state, employing then 260 ships and fourteen thousand sailors. Prior to this, houses pro- vided with tanks and boilers for reducing the blubber and preparing the bone, were established on the northern coast of Spitzbergen.

The American whale fishery was commenced at Nantucket, where in 1672, James Lopar and John Savage were given a subsidy of land and a third interest with the town in the business of securing the whales which came to their shores. The people of Cape Cod had become proficient in securing and utilizing the whale, and in 1690 Ichabod Padduck of Provincetown was considered an expert in meth- ods of capturing the whale and extracting the oil. He went to Nan- tucket, where his instructive descriptions of his successful methods were dignified with the name lectures.

The more enterprising white settlers, assisted by the more vent- uresome Indians, made trips in open boats beyond the sight of land, and when a whale was killed, with such rude weapons as his size had suggested, he was towed ashore, where the tedious process of securing the oil was carried on. The blubber was conveyed on carts to "try- houses," where in kettles the oil was extracted. Fifty years before the revolution, Boston was exporting large quantities of whale prod- ucts; and the towns of the Cape, and the court of Plymouth were col- lecting revenues from the stranded whales found on their shores. The introduction of larger vessels, equipped with apparatus for cutting up the blubber, marked a new era in the industry, although a single whale, producing 250 barrels of oil and 3,000 pounds of bone, made a cargo for what was then called a good sized vessel, and the practice of bringing the blubber to the " try-houses " on shore still prevailed.

The equipping of larger ships, with furnaces for rendering and casks for storing the oil, marked a third epoch in the history of the great whaling industry, and with facilities thus increased the fields of operation were enlarged. In July, 1730, the North American whale- men sent 9,200 tuns of oil and 154 tons of bone to England.

The whaling grounds at Davis' straits were first visited by whalers in 1746; Baffin's bay in 1751; Gulf of St. Lawrence, 1761; eastern banks

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HISTORY OF BARNSTABLE COUNTY.

of Newfoundland, 1765; Brazilian coasts in 1774. The introduction of ' the New England product into the markets of England furnished a motive to that government for granting its own seamen a large bounty to stimulate the whale industry, and under that impulse the produc- tion increased more rapidly than the demand, and thus the profits to American whalemen were greatly diminished.

In 1771 Barnstable county had thirty-six vessels engaged in the whale fishery. Of these, two were from Barnstable, employing thir- teen seamen each, and for the four years preceding the revolution they secured 240 barrels of oil each year; Falmouth equipped four vessels of seventy-five tons each, and brought in 400 barrels annually; while Wellfleet had thirty vessels, with a total tonnage of 2,600, employing 420 men, taking annually 4,500 barrels.

The war here interrupts the chain of statistics, which would cer- tainly show that the industry was neglected during the struggle. It was, however, soon revived, and in 1787-1789 this county had sixteen whale vessels engaged, whose total tonnage was 1,120, and whose 212 'seamen secured 1,920 barrels of oil annually.

Captain Jesse Holbrook of Wellfleet, who flourished in revolution- ary days, was a skillful whaler, and in one voyage killed fifty-two sperm whales. His great success obtained for him employment by a London company for twelve years, teaching their employees his art. After a checkered career he returned to Wellfleet in 1795, where he subsequently died, aged seventy years.

The whalers' voyages, at first, scarcely taking them beyond sight of their own ports, came later to be passages of thousands of miles, requiring ten to fifty months, and sometimes longer, to complete. The men who gained wealth or renown in this hazardous vocation were the grave, persevering, sober men, who represented the best blood of the Cape; and those venerable retired captains who, in their advancing years, still remain in almost every Cape town, constitute one of the most substantial elements of the population. In the histo- ries of the towns in which they reside the reader may find record of some thrilling adventures in the experience of Captains Nathaniel Burgess, Silas Jones, Caleb O. Hamblin, N. P. Baker, Edward Penni- man and others, which are illustrative of the life that whaleship masters were obliged to lead.

Falmouth early became an important town in this business, and from Woods Holl several ships were equipped and sent to the Pacific and Arctic whaling grounds. The details of their voyages more fully appear in the history of the town of Falmouth in this volume. - The business from the other whaling ports of the lower Cape was still more extensive, but the details as given of the voyages from the port of Woods Holl furnish a general idea of the whalemen's experiences,

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INDUSTRIAL RESOURCES.

. and the decline of the industry there, may be a fair indication of when and how rapidly the attention of the Cape people was turned to other pursuits.

In 1834 Falmouth had six whale ships at sea, and in 1837 had nine, the total tonnage of which was 2,823; in 1845 her vessels numbered five, with an average tonnage of 315; in 1855 three whalers were re- ported as securing $55,000 worth of oil. Provincetown, in 1837, had only two whale ships out; in 1841 six vessels returned, bringing 1,065 barrels of oil; in 1843 sixteen vessels from here were on whaling voy- ages; in 1845 twenty-six vessels, with a tonnage of 3,255, secured during the census year $102,984 worth of oil; in 1855 seventeen vessels were in the business, reporting $118,833 earnings for the year: in 1865 twenty-eight vessels reported oil worth $312,017; and in 1885 the town had only three vessels thus engaged. For the census year 1855 Or- leans reported four vessels of 155 tons each, employing 125 men, and securing oil to the amount of $19,250. Thus as the vocation became less profitable, and its prosecution imposed greater hardships upon those who followed it, the Cape people gradually dropped out of it or went in those ships which later on still sailed from New Bedford.

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History of Barnstable County, Massachusetts, 1620-1890, Part 15

Author: Deyo, Simeon L., ed Publication date: 1890 Publisher: New York : Blake Number of Pages: 1292

Author: Deyo, Simeon L., ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: New York : Blake
Number of Pages: 1292