History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 215

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1538

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I > Part 215

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This was the sad ending of the career of a brave and useful man. He had been a deacon of the church in Rowley, probably from the death of Thomas Mig- hill. His age was but forty-six. Had he lived, un- doubtedly his energies and enthusiasm would have been strongly felt in the early history of Georgetown.

Ninety-nine years later, and that same locality was the theatre of events equally bloody, and the descend- ants of Captain Brocklebank's Rowley neighbors were there by forced marches, too late, however, to join the " embattled farmers as they stood, and fired the shot heard round the world." Coming here a lad of eight, growing up with the Rowley settlement, his tragic ending gives a gleam of story to our history in the seventeenth century such as we get from no other source. But Georgetown in an especial manner can claim his career as her own, for here was his farm, cleared to some extent by him, and here was, we be- lieve, his first habitation looking toward a permanent home. His inventory has this item: "farme toward Bradford, 150 lbs." With house in Rowley is added " kilne." Whole estate, £442 11s. His eldest son, Samuel, born November 28, 1653, occupied the farm in 1685, and unquestionably lived here.

November 20, 1686, a committee met at Samnel Brocklebank's house to consider his claim for damage by a highway opened through his farm. This may have been the Elm Street road, now formally opened, and perhaps by a more direct route to the Ipswich and Andover road than before-crossing Nelson Street at the foot of Adams Hill, near Mrs. W. M. Shute's, and so easterly and close beside the sharp range of hills, parallel with the railroad, until we pass Oak Dell Grove and reach the wooden bridge across Pen Brook, just below Lake Raynor. This ancient way, the direct way to Thomas Hazen's, who, two years be- fore, had settled about midway of a large tract south of and adjoining Lake Raynor, and also to Daniel Wood's was opened probably at this time. In 1712 Hazen sold his three hundred acre farm, all lying in one body and south of the lake, with his dwelling- house in what is now the Samuel Perley lot, and re-

moved to Connecticut. Two hundred and fifty acres were deeded to Jacob Perley, and the balance of sixty acres to Timothy Perkins, of Topsfield. This was a Boxford farm, but the connections of Thomas Hazen were so identified with South Georgetown for nearly a century after that a brief mention does not seem amiss. Sixteen acres of land were granted Brocklebank for damage because of highway. This land given him was on the west side of his farm, with one corner on " Widdow Lambert's farme," who was probably the widow of Francis Lambert, of Rowley. This was the same tract which, nearly twenty-five years before, had been laid out to Mrs. Rogers, but at this time, prob- ably, all of Mrs. Rogers' land liad come into the pos- session of the Lambert family.

Returning to our pioneers on the hill, we find John Spofford continuing his labors from year to year. Without any competitors to cheapen the price of his labor, watching over the young cattle, penuing them by night, with freedom to roam where they might by day, generally, however, up the slopes and on the summit of Baldpate, where, from some cause, there was a natural clearing, an entire want of the old tim- bered growth which covered all the upland beside.

With the regularity of the seasons he gathers the hay-harvest from "Half-moon Meadow," still called by the same expressive name. Only at long intervals, and then in settled weather, would a traveler be seen on foot or horse, journeying along the "old path that goeth toward Andover." Eight years passed, and on the 16th of March, 1677, the lease was transferred by Mr. Spofford to his sons John and Samuel, and ex- tended to the new lessees sixty years from date. Per- haps the father thought the town had driven a hard "bargon " with him, or the " gravelle plain " was not as productive as was expected, or, possibly, further encouragement was needed to keep the young men from returning to Rowley village, but from some cause there was an abatement of the rent. Unlike the hard fate of the Irish peasant, who sees his rent rise with every slight improvement on his acre of bog, their rent was reduced to eight pounds, with the results of eight years' labor added to its original value.

Ministry rates to be paid "for what stocke they keep upon the saide land, and for all broke-up land and unbroke land, as the inhabitants of the town doe pay." " Allso they have liberty to pay in porke their rent if they see cause." Acorns and all species of mast (walnuts of every kind) were especially abun- dant in all the country south of this parish farm, and swine must have been grown at a nominal cost.

To this day the same district south and east of Baldpate Hill is noted for the abundance of its crop of walnuts, making quite an item in the aggregated products of the farms. Included in this supplemen- tary lease is this clause, "And duringe the times of the Indian wars there rent is to be abated accordinge to the judgment of indifferent men, if they be hin- dered in carrying on the saide farme." A strong

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probability that they might have to return to Rowley with at least pecuniary loss.

This anticipated danger from the Indian fighter, with the fever for blood raging in him just at this time, reveals the cause which had prevented, more than anything else, that rapid settlement of the three thousand acres expected by the town fathers eight years before. One of the most valued citizens of the town, and to a certain extent their only neighbor, had, but a few years before, given up his life to pro- tect such as they and theirs from the bullet and the torch. In Captain Brocklebank's death the realities of Indian war came home to them with a force never felt before. The conclusion of the lease, showing but a faint conception of the opulence which a century later would surround some branches of the family, is this, " At the end of there lease they are to be allow- ed for all buildings on the saide farme, to be vallued by indifferent men, provided they are not to exceede above twenty pounds." At the date of the lease John Spofford was twenty-nine and his brother Samuel twenty-five years of age. The father probably returned to Rowley village.

The will of John Spofford is on record at the regis- ter of deeds' office in Salem. A few bequests are given. He bequeaths a portion to son Francis, and that it may be at his wife's disposal until he become of the age of one and twenty years, and that he may be helpful to her to carry on her husbandry work. Francis to have the small gun and rapier. The long fowling-piece to go to son John. Four acres toward great meadow to go to Francis, and son Thomas his village land. Sons Samuel and John the lease of the farm. Two cows to wife, one cow to each of his daughters. To Francis, two young oxen, one mare and one cart. The gray horse to Thomas. Three sheep to each of his daughters and to sons John and Thomas. One sheep to his wife and one heifer or calf to wife and each of his daughters. The date of this death is not known. Was not living in 1691. His name does not appear in the tax list of that year. Probably owned property in Rowley, on which Fran- eis and the widow lived for a time.

His inventory as valued is recorded as £223 9s. Another of the first settlers of Rowley, whose name figures somewhat prominently in the land transfers of the seventeenth century in this section of the town, now Georgetown, was Richard Swan. It is not thought that he lived here, but he had land bounded by Pen Brook, and partly by ye farme granted to Mr. Samuel Shepard, of Rowley, on the northwest, on the southeast by land of Mr. Edward Payson, on the southwest by land in possession of Ebenezer Boyn- ton and partly by land of Samuel Brocklebank, and on the northeast by Benjamin Plumer's land. This was centrally located, between what is now North Street and Main Street, toward the Marlborough dis- trict extending from Pen Brook on the west, over or near the land of John Preston eastwardly, to an un-

known distance. The bounds of this tract were the same as those recorded in the deed of June 5, 1712, from Hannah Swan, the widow, then of Haverhill, to Joseph Bointon, who was doubtless a son-in-law, Swan having died in 1678. That deed conveyed all the lands and meadows within the town of Rowley, which the said Boynton deeded to her late hushand, of date May 27, 1678. These lands were seemingly held by Swan but for a few months only, having been bought of Bointon, who held the office of town clerk of Rowley for thirteen years, from 1679 to '91, and who was the original owner. In 1672 these lands were again in Boynton's hands, and that deed was probably a quit- claim by the widow.

Mrs. Swan was then evidently quite aged and prob- ably living with a son, whose house and family dur- ing the Indian attack on Haverhill four years before, were saved. Tradition says that several Indians were about to force an entrance into the Swan house through the partially open door, when the wife with Amazonian courage, seizing her spit, which was near- ly three feet in length, collected all the strength she possessed, and drove it through the body of the fore- most Indian. This was a resistance they little ex- pected, and thus repulsed they retreated and molested them no further.

This land grant adds the names of Boynton and Swan to the list of early land owners, the Broekle- banks (Samuel and John), Humphrey Rainer and Thomas Mighill, having taken much of the land at the south of this.

Besides the above, there was of the Swan land a piece of meadow at the eastward near Stony Brook so called, perhaps the Hilliard Brook. This was owned by Boynton, and sold by him to Benj. Plumer in 1708.

In May, 1714, Joseph Bointon deeded to Richard Bointon one-half of this land, said to have belonged to Richard's grandfather Swan, Richard not being satisfied with previous gifts, and Joseph also agreed "to defend from Benoni Boynton, who aims to cut off' Richard from what my father hath given him." This Joseph was said to be a brother of Richard, but there is some mistake, for he must have been a brother of Richard's father. Swan was deputy for several years, and prominent in town affairs.

In town expenses for 1667-68 we find Richard Swan paid for deputyship .£3 9s.d. In those days the towns bore the expense of deputies. Also " for lainge out land and goinge to Salem and horse hire, 13s." Swan, with others, was selected for locating highways (a very responsible work), also, "to agree with the sons of John Spoflord about ye farm," and was appointed, with Lient. Broeklebank and Ezekiel Northend, February 21, 1672, to lay out the farm of one hundred acres near Crane Meadows, voted to be laid out to the child of Mr. Samuel Shepard at the meeting on the previ- ous January. This Mr. Shepard, the third minister in Rowley, was a colleague with Rev. Mr. Phillips from

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November, 1665, to his death, April 7, 1668, at the early age of twenty-seven years. He left one son, an orphan, the mother dying about two months before the father. The town voted in January, 1672, the before-named grant to the Shepard boy, then past three years old, provided "it did live unto the age of twenty-one years," but March 13th, on re-considera- tion, it was granted without conditions, probably on the remonstrance of the boy's grandmother, Mrs. Margery Hoar, widow of Rev. Henry Flint, first minister of the old church in Quincy, then in Brain- tree. Mrs. Flint, then sole executor of the will of her son-in-law, Mr. Shepard, and the education of young Samuel Shepard, the son of her daughter Dorothy, devolving upon her, wrote, like a strong-minded wo- man, a sharp letter to the town of Rowley, which no doubt brought about definite action. The tomb- stone of Mrs. Flint informs us that for many years she was noted as an instructress of young geutlewo- men, many being sent to her, especially from Boston. This "Shepard farm," as it was named, for many years was quite noted as a boundary point in deeds. Young Shepard was graduated from Harvard College in 1685, at the age of eighteen, and this land con- tinued to be held by him until 1694. August 28th, of that year, he, while living in Lynn, probably with his nncle Jeremiah Shepard, pastor of the first church in that town, sold his " ferme" to Joseph and Jonathan Plummer.

This famous Shepard land was doubtless located on the southerly side of North Street, but, perhaps, in- cluded both sides of the street, from Pen Brook at the present causeway, to the residence of S. S. Hardy, then eastwardly for some distance at the south of the street, including what was afterwards known as the "Baptist Parsonage Farm." It is said in the deed to be " on the south side of ye old path called Andover path." At about the same time as this Shepard grant, land was laid ont to Mr. Francis Parrot, in the vicinity of what is now known as the Searl place, on the hill. This Parrot was town clerk of Rowley for several years, and is said to have returned to Eng- land, and died there. If this is correct, this grant was a freehold to his heirs. It adjoined Anthony Crosbies' land, and was near Reedy meadow and also the Shepard farm. In the farm purchase is the first mention of the Plumer name in Georgetown. Origi- nally a Newbnry family, the name of Benjamin Plnmer first appears as a Rowley resident in 1678.

Returning to 1665, we find from all the records of the town of Rowley, an eagerness for land-grants in the commons. There were, at least, three divisions prior to the year 1700, the first division being made soon after the establishment of the settlement. In the year 1667 the three thousand acres were surveyed. This tract seems to have been nearly preserved intact, the only diminishing of the town commons being the setting off of the parish farm the following year. Dec. 30th of the same year, with perhaps accusation of

favoritism, and complaints of an assumption of author- ity floating about. "the Lot-layers were ordered by the town not to Lay out any Lands with in the Township of Rowley, but by notis of some Express grant in writing, both for plan and quantity." Envy and de- traction were doing its work, and as has been pre- viousły said, it was becoming difficult to find men who would perform the duty with the certainty that fault-finding was sure to follow.

The death of King Philip giving a relief from the anxiety of the two years preceding, and renewed courage in back-woods life, it was voted by the town, January 22, 1677 :

"That those appoynter to Returne Land or cases, to wit, tho old Select men, and the lottlayers of both ends of the towne, Shoulde also Examine the right that men have to frecholds they lay claim to, that they may be Recorded."

Human nature is alike grasping, within the nar- row limits of Rowley, as on the broad prairies of the West. In 1679 the town went further and chose a committee at the meeting March 27th, to consider the situation, and endeavor to reconcile energy and am- bition, with equity and fair-dealing, a problem equally difficult to solve, then, as well as now.

It is to be hoped that they partially succeeded, for the "men chosen to joyne with the Select men, to consider of questions that may arise about the Divi- sion of the Comons, and are to Returne their thoughts about them," were men of the prominence of " thomas lambert, John pickard, Mr. (Philip) Nelson, leonard harriman, John tod and thomas leaver, Junior."

May 20, 1685, "At a Leaguel Towne meeting, it was Agreed and voted, that corporal northend, daniel wicam, Ezekiel Mighill, John pickard and - John- son, be a committee to fixe the bounds of the three thousand akers, comonly so-called." Considerable interest began to be felt in roads and other improve- ments here, and some were considering a possible settlement. It seems to have been feared that this tract might be encroached upon, it having been evi- dently reserved for a general and careful distribution, and, therefore, this renewed survey was ordered.

For years, the hay on the meadow land, where ac- cessible, had been cut, being the only product of this common land, but at the time of this survey Rock Pond Meadow had been granted temporarily. The meadows were still appreciated so highly, that when Bradford appealed to Rowley in a pathetic let- ter, dated March, 1680-81 (now in the Rowley records), for an additional grant of land, or aid of some kind, Rowley, a few days later replies, that they cannot grant more territory, but will "give Rev. Mr. Symmes Liberty for Six or Siven Loads of Hay yearly, of that meddow called Rock Pond Meddow, till the towne Shall Se Canse to order it otherwise." It was poor satisfaction for Bradford to ask for a change of bound- ary, and only get a few loads of meadow hay, with the privilege of cutting it themselves.

But to again continne the earlier land grants.

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Before 1687, land was laid out on Long Hill, to John Acie, probably a son of William, who was an original settler of Rowley. This land was inherited by a daughter, who married a Burbank. Acie continued to have land there, as late as 1701. This name seems to be an anomaly among Essex County names. In 1691 Sarah, the widow of John Brocklebank, sold land to a Boynton, probably Joseph. She had been a widow for more than twenty-five years, her husband dying a few years after his grant near Pen Brook, in 1661, perhaps in 1663. The heirs bought some of the Thomas Mighill land. This Brocklebank family had all this land east of the brook, extending to Marl- borough, and it is thought, only held it for one gen- eration, when it was probably sold to the Boyntons, perhaps to Ebenezer. What became of them is not known ; all of the name in this vicinity are descend- ants of Capt. Samuel's, eldest and youngest sons. Another name of an early date, is that of David Wheeler, found on a deed of date 1691, on a transfer of land to Nathaniel Browne. He was probably the first to settle in the vicinity of the Goodrich house on North Street. Was the father of Jonathan Wheeler, who a few years later rose to especial prominence. David Wheeler had removed, or was not living in town in 1701, as his name is not found on the list of Rowley men in that locality, petitioning for an abatement of minister rates. He sold June 6, 1693, thirty acres of land to John Spofford, said to adjoin Benj. Goodrich's land.

In 1707 Jonathan Wheeler deeded all the undivided lands in Newbury, belonging to his father, David Wheeler, to a Mr. Coffin.

In 1697 Jonathan Wheeler was said to be of Row- ley, and was perhaps living in the town four years be- fore.

August 24, 1693, he deeded about twenty aeres of upland and meadow, lying near Crane Pond, said to have been bought previously of Philip Nelson, to the next heirs of the late Benjamin Guttridge (Goodrich), the former deed supposed to have been burnt in the house. This land was granted to Wheeler by the town of Rowley.

"John Spawford's" land was on the northwest ; bonght the same year of the Brownes. Nathaniel Brownesold Spofford fifty-four acres, his brother, Eben- ezer twelve, making with that sold Spofford by Wheeler a tract of ninety-six acres. This land was on or near Thurlow Street, then known as Bradford highway, by which it was bounded, also by the brook (Parker River), and owners of Ox-pasture Hill. The house and land of John Brown is mentioned in David Wheeler's deed ; where it was, it is not possible per- haps to tell at this day.

Cornet Parsons' land is said to be on the southwest of the land deeded by Jonathan Wheeler to the Goodrich heirs, and " Three logg bridge " named, was the bridge over Parker River, on Thurlow Street. These three Brownes, John, Ebenezer and Nathaniel,

were on the list of parish petitioners in 1701. Nathaniel soon after removed to Groton, Conn. While there, January 8, 1708, he sold for four pounds a freehold in Rowlev to Daniel Wood, of Boxford. Ebenezer probably remained; twenty years later land was known by his name. The mention in Wheeler's deed of the former deed being burned in the house of Goodrich, reveals of itself nothing but a barren fact. We have the story, however. It was the year previous to this just act of Wheeler's when the tragedy we are now to relate occurred.

October 23, 1692, was the Lord's day. Mr. Good- rich living in this locality, in a house of small dimen - sions, doubtless such as were common on the frontier at that time, was at evening prayer with his family, when the house was suddenly attacked by a small band of Indians, and Mr. Goodrich, his wife and several children were killed. One daughter, a girl of seven, is said to have been carried off' a captive, but redeem- ed at the expense of the Province the spring fol- lowing.

The house, after being sacked, was at least partially burned. It was a common occurrence for the Indians to destroy in wantoness what plunder they could not carry away, and if time would warrant also, to burn the house raided. This family were living here in fancied security, but for some time before there had been frequent Indian raids on the frontier, especially at the eastward. In 1688 the former enmity ineited by the French in Canada was renewed, and the ex- pedition of Sir William Phipps against Canada, in 1690, having proved the most disastrous failure New England had ever known, the Indians became daring, and for two years after were busy with carnage.

This tragedy seems to have been an unpremeditated act by a roving band, and tradition says they were so angered at not accomplishing the object of their raid, the death of some one in Newbury, against whom they had a long standing grudge, that accidentally approaching this house, the unprotected inmates were made the mark for their malice and wrath. As one thinks of it the incident seems hardly credible, and that it could have occurred miles from the border and the raiders escape with their captives and booty. We can imagine the horror felt by the Brownes on the Bradford road, by the Wheelers, Plumers, Poors, and especially so by Deacon Brocklebank's family up by Pen Brook, and the Spoffords on the hill, as guided by the burning house, they hastened, only to find a family silent in death, mangled and bloody, with their house-dog howling his agony over his slain friends and playmates. Whether the house was entirely or partially burned may be a matter of con- troversy and an open question. In 1840, when Gage's "History of Rowley " was written, a wood-cut of the Lull house, then standing a few rods west of the resi- dence of G. D. Tenney, Esq., was inserted as the house where the massacre occurred, and the window pointed out through which the Indians fired. That

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the burning was at least partially accomplished, per- haps all the interior, is from the deed of Wheeler made almost a certainty, and that by the efforts of the neighbors the fire was extinguished and a part of the house saved. From this saved part, east of the front door, extensions were made at different times until the spacious mansion we knew as the old Lull house was the result. It seems that such an event would have been so impressed upon the occupants of the Lull house, from one generation to another, that they could not possibly have been entirely in error when the story was brought down from sire to son, that in this room and through that window the Goodrich family were shot. The one grave in which they were buried is near by, unmarked, however, by any memo- rial. It should be a pleasing duty for those bearing the name to place something there in recognition of their sad fate. It is doubtful whether they had lived there above a year or two.

From this date to 1700 every movement looking to- ward a settlement was in this locality or just east- ward.

December 1, 1693, Henry Poor bought twenty-eight acres of land of John Pierson, of Rowley. "Miller " Pierson owned the old Nelson Mill on Mill River. This was a part of Pierson's common land in the third division. John Bayley, probably of Boston, owned land near by. The other boundary points named in the deed were "the meadow laid out to Samuel Shepard (not the Shepard farm), Bradford highway, also south- west of Wheeler's and Goodrich land." Perhaps Poor built on the north side of Thurlow Street. The land extended to " Three logg bridge brook," which must then have been the name of Parker River, at the point where Thurlow Street crosses it.

About thirty years later, Henry Poor and his son Benjamin, in a deed to Benjamin Plumer, sold a corner of the land on which (the deed states), "we now dwell," indicating a change of residence in the meantime. Poor was Newbury born. Benjamin, the eldest son, was married about the time of the change of house.

In 1707 Jonathan Wheeler sold to Nathaniel Cof- fin, one-half of Poor's interest in the undivided lands of Newbury.

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History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 215

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1 Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1538

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton), ed. n 85042884-1
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1538