History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 231

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1672

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 231

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

CHAPTER CLIII.

HAVERHILL-(Continued).

Indian Alarms-Under Andros-Settlement of Mr. Rolfe as Minister- Preparations for Defense-The New Charter-Building of the Second Meeting-House.

FOR thirty years from its beginning, the little set- tlement at Haverhill had been blest with peace and prosperity. There had been no discouragements or privations, save those necessarily attending a pioneer enterprise in the wilderness.

The people had been permitted substantially to manage their own affairs. They had even secured by persistence the object of their supreme desire-a great territory. The inhabitants were a sturdy community. They were of one stock. With scarcely an exception, they were Englishmen. There were even no Scotch- men. One may suspect that Michael Emerson was an Irishman. Tradition says that Joanna Davis, the wife of George Corliss, was a native of Wales. None of the settlers were from the Continent of Enrope. And what in this way was true of Haverhill, was true of New England as a whole. It was a homogeneous people. It is a trite remark that no connty of England was so English as Massa- chusetts. The population of New England in 1640, when immigration substantially ceased, has been estimated as high as 26,000. It is believed their descendants at the present time number fifteen millions, or one-quarter of the population of the United States. The people of Haverhill were solid English ycomen, with respectable intelligence. Crime was not unknown, but was not rife among them. They were a God-fearing, sober people. It may be declared without fear of contradiction, that in 1675 the village of Haverhill was superior to the average community in rural England. Narrow and bigoted, there was nevertheless about them a certain eleva- tion, born of the motives with which they had come to America and the enterprise in which they had been engaged. They were sturdy, resolute, self- reliant.

Their isolation in the wilderness had made them watchful of danger, and the policy of the government had created and maintained military discipline and

the habit of constant preparation for defense. But the settlers of Haverhill, in the first generation, can have entertained no very aente apprehension of peril from Indian warfare. As we have seen, they found few natives here. They had wisely bought the Indian title for what it was worth. Sir Edmund Andros, indeed, afterward said of the Indian deeds, "that their hand was worth no more than a scratch with a bear's paw." But Andros' favorite theory was, that all titles must come from the King. After the loss of the charter in 1684, at a town-meeting held June 18, 1685, in Boston, a committee was charged with the duty of buying any claim, "legal or pretended," which the Indians might advance to " Deare Island, the Necke of Boston, or any part thereof." An Indian title might be a feeble instrument, but it was better than nothing. As the Haverhill pioneers found few or no Indians upon the spot, they had no collision with them afterwards, and apparently, little annoyance from them. There were doubtless strag- gling parties or individuals who disturbed the in- habitanis living without the village, just as " strag- glers " and tramps have frightened the women and children of the country in modern times. Some trade was carried on with them, and when they could pro- cure fire water they were quarrelsome and dangerons. It was the colony policy to forbid, or at least to restrain, the sale of liquor to the Indians. A law was passed at November Court, 1654, prohibiting all persons, ex- cept those specially licensed, from selling "any In- dian or Indians either wine or strong liquor of any sort," under a penalty of 20s. per pint, and in that proportion for all quantities, more or less. Henry Palmer, of llaverhill, and Roger Shaw, of Hampton, were the only persons so licensed in the whole county of Norfolk.

In 1646, Eliot began his noble labors among the Indians, and before King Philip's War some thousands of them had been gathered into villages, and were known as Praying Indians. A great work had doubt- less been done among them. But of course many of the Praying Indians had assumed only the thinnest varnish of civilization and Christianity. Many of them were pilferers and vagabonds. However the whites may have differed as to the extent of the change worked in them by the missionaries, they generally agreed in considering the Praying Indians as harm- less. Thus they obtained the dangerous privilege of roaming about the settlements at will. They got fire- arms and ammunition. Some of this class were after- wards the most dangerous enemies of the whites. Among them was Simon, who figures in the local annals of Haverhill and the vicinity. He found his haunts in this town and Amesbury. In 1672 he and another Indian named Samuel were fined five pounds " for stealing Englishman's horse." When the war broke out, he is said to have improved the opportun- ity to get vengeance upon those against whom he had a grudge, and became the terror of the neighboring

Pig

The tie

re3

tre pr

b F

th c

1939

HAVERHILL.

settlements. One writer speaks of him " As the arch- villain and incendiary of all the Eastern Indians." And yet Hubbard tells us he spared an old woman at Portsmouth, " because he said she had been kind to his grandmother."

Previous to 1675 the settlers in general regarded the Indians with indifference or contempt. There had been little sympathy with the efforts of Eliot, Gookin, Bourne, Mayhew and a few other self-sacrific- ing men to Christianize and civilize them. They were regarded in the main as worthless creatures, and, on the whole, an obstruction to the enjoyment of the land by God's chosen people. But there had been no general cruelty or oppression practiced towards them, and the law, theoretically, treated them as it did the whites. Now from this state of apathy there was a bloody awakening.

Alarm began to be felt in Haverhill early in 1675. Rumors of threatened hostility among the Indians were flying thickly. It had been the custom, in the early days, to have some semblance of a fort in every new settlement. The trees, which had been felled to clear the ground, were used for protection. Thus, at Cambridge, the present college yard aud common were originally inclosed and fortified by palisades, the trees being driven closely into the ground and their tops united by birch withes. Within this in- closure the people could take refuge, and the cattle could be driven in at night.

Some time previously a fortification had been built around the meeting-house at Haverhill, but it had been suffered to fall into decay. At a meeting called February 18, 1875, to concert measures suitable to the danger apprehended, it was ordered that "the Selectmen shall forthwith cause the fortifications to be finished, to make port-holes in the walls, to right up those places that are defective and likely to fall and to make a flanker at the east corner, that the work, in case of need, may be made use of against the common enemy."

Daniel Ladd, Peter Ayer and Thomas Whittier were appointed to designate what houses should be garri- soned ; and the "old brush and top wood " on the common was ordered to be burned-to prevent the concealment and stealthy approach of the In- dians.

Hostilities did not actually commence for some time after. At about four P.M. June 21, 1675, an express reached Governor Leverett in Boston from Governor Winslow, of the old colony, informing him that on Sunday, the day before, the people of Swansea had re- treated to their block-house, on account of Indian ap- proach. Leverett, an old soldier of the English Civil War, had, before the 28th, sent three hundred foot and eighty horse, besides arms, ammunition and provis- ions, to the aid of the Plymouth men. A fast was appointed for the 29th of June in Massachusetts. The General Court furuished the militia in the fron- tier towns with arms and ammunition, and ordered

foritfications and garrisons to be made ready, without delay.

The sufferings of Plymouth colony in King Philip's War were terrible. The debt she incurred was sup- posed to amount to more than all her personal prop- erty. But it was paid to the last penny. Twelve or thirteen towns were destroyed in what is now Massa- chusetts. Six hundred dwelling-houses of the Eng- lish were burned. Massachusetts had a population of about twenty-five thousand; she lost five or six hun- dred men, at least one-tenth of her fighting force.

Very little injury was done in the immediate vicin- ity of Haverhill. But the alarm and distress were dreadful. March 19, 1676, came the news that the Indians were crossing the Merrimac at Wamesit (Lowell). Couriers were at once despatched to Ips- wich for aid. Major-General Dennison wrote to the Governor that there was great alarm in Andover and Haverhill, and that he was sending up sixty men. Fortunately, this rumor proved unfounded. But the people of Andover wrote the Governor April 7th, earnestly eraving aid, and informing him that their town had been twice attacked and the people had be- gun to move away. May 2d Ephraim Kingsbury, of Haverhill, was killed by the Indians-the first, it is supposed, slain by them in the town, but the particu- lars have been lost. The next day, May 3d, Haver- hill Simon, with two other Praying Indians, made a murderous attack, the story of which belongs more properly to the history of Bradford.

Jolın Littlehale, of Haverhill, is said to have been killed by the Indians September 18, 1675. King Philip, the origin and brain of the Indian assault, was killed August 12, 1676. The following winter a truce was concluded with the Eastern Indians.

The terror of Northeastern Massachusetts, which suffered less in King Philip's War than its southern and western portions, may be inferred from a propo- sition under consideration by the General Court March 23, 1676, to build a fence of stockades (pali- sades) or stones, eiglit feet high, between the head of navigation on the River Charles and the Concord River, at Billerica, for the protection of Essex County and part of Middlesex. And the court ordered one able and fit man from each of the towns proposed to be included, to meet at Cambridge March 3Ist, to survey the ground, estimate the expense and report in writing how it might be prosecuted and effected, and what each town should pay, etc. Nearly all the towns reported.

Capt. John Hull, the mint-master, was also treasurer of the colony. He made entry in his journal August 24, 1676, of £24 168. 8d., paid on account of "Haverhill Towne " soldiers, according to "Sundry acceptances," in sums of from five shillings to seventeen shillings and ten pence. Their names were Samuel Fluchins, Nathaniel Haseltine, Samuel Aires, John Keisar, John Clements, Amos Singletens (Singletery ?), Na- thaniel Lad, Daniel Lad, George Brown, John John-

1940

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

son, Philip Esman, Benjamin Singleterry, Thomas Durston, Thomas Eastman, Thomas Hartshorn, Rich- ard Allin, Robert Swan, Henry Kemball, Benjamin Grealey, Jonathan Henrick, John Corly, Jolin Roby, Samuel Ladd, Thomas Kinsbury, Robert Swan, John Haseltine, Samuel Notts, Joseph Bond-twenty- eiglit in number. These were doubtless all drafted men, i. e., from the militia of the town. In all our early wars, drafting was the recognized mode of fill- ing up the military quota. There was then nothing opprobrious in drafting or being drafted. To fight, when necessary, was the duty of every able-bodied man, just as it was to vote, to pay taxes, to hold of- fice, to go to meeting. The law provided how all these obligations should be discharged. Duty was not only honorable, it was compulsory. All belonged to the militia who were able to discharge its functions. This was a matter of course. But all could not be spared, or were not needed for the field. Then all took an equal chance, and those drawn out must march. This was a matter of course, too, and simple enough, according to their ideas. Nor does it appear to have involved any discredit to procure a substitute if a drafted man's business or health or convenience required his presence at home. Volun- teering had not, in those days, as in more recent, a magic sound, and duty, rather than sentiment, con- trolled mainly the citizen's conduct, in war as well as in peace. And they fought grimly against the heath- en foe, as men under the special protection of Jeho- vah. When Captain Mason had exterminated the Pequots, he wrote: "Thus was God seen in the Mount, crushing his proud enemies."

July 12, 1777, Saltonstall, of Haverhill, and oth- ers of Bradford and Andover, petitioned the General Court for " more provision for protection, on account of present appearance and warning of danger."

In response, the court ordered one-fifth of the men to be kept continually on scout, taking turns, so that all should bear their part. The towns were, in effect, told to protect themselves. This was correct, so far, for King Philip's War had fallen as lightly on these towns as almost any in the colony, although they had doubtless suffered terribly from anxiety and alarm, through their exposed situation. Honses were gar- risoned and scouts kept upon the watch night and day. As late as 1684 thirty-five troopers were kept constant- ly on the move on the borders of IIaverhill, Ames- bury and Salisbury, and the foot companies in each town were constantly in readiness.

In October, 1675 the Court ordered a special tax of £1533 to pay the expense of the war with the Indians. Boston paid £300; Charlestown, £180; Dorchester, £40; and Roxbury, £30. The proportion of Haverhill was £18. This was hard to get, and a town-meeting was called November 18th " to allow the inhabitants to make staves enough to pay the eight rates required by the country, so as to save bread corn, which men cannot well live without."

The issue of King Philip's War culminating in the complete overthrow of the Narragansetts, secured permanent peace with the Indians for Southern New England. Their power was broken. As an element of danger they were destroyed in that section. By midsummer in 1678 there was peace everywhere and qniet everywhere in that region. Henceforward the Indian only disturbed New England when he came down from the North as an ally and through the in- stigation of the Frenchman. And to that danger, Haverhill, as a frontier town, was exposed for forty years longer. Her reign of terror had hardly begun. But for a little while after King Philip's War there was tranquillity. Confidence returned in a measure and the much harried colonists hoped to enjoy the fruits of their labor.

From 1675 to 1678 the town had been too much disturbed by the Indian war to attend to anything else, but in 1683, 1684 and 1686 they found time in the annual meetings to listen to land claims by Job Clement, Robert Swan, Sr. and others, and charges and counter-charges of wrong about land bounds between John Gild and Lieut. Johnson and between Robert Swan and Lieut. George Brown.

Robert Swan was early in Haverhill and a lot- holder, but he seems to have been often in hot water. The famous Council of 1656 thought "there was too great appearance of much iniquity on Goodman Swan's part in this matter." He was probably a pas- sionate man. In 1666 he was fined by the County Court "30s. for striking John Carleton several blows," whilst Carleton was fined £3 for striking him. In 1673 the town ordered him to " pull down " a ditch he had made across one of the town's highways or be prosecuted. In 1674 he was fined 20s. for being drunk and cursing. July 2, 1694, there was a special meeting at which it was voted to resist Swan's claim to the meadow laid out for the ministry. But he ap- parently had the confidence of the people, after all. IIe served in King Philip's War, was on the commit- tee with Mr. Ward in 1683 to procure an associate pastor, and in 1686 on the committee to view disputed or uncertain bounds. He was highway surveyor in 1692, and deputy to the General Court in 1684. In 1689 his sons Samuel and Joshua were brought before Major Nathaniel Saltonstall as a magistrate, upon a complaint for cutting down some of Simon Wain- wright's best apple trees. Swan sent the major a notice which Myrick prints, forbidding him to pro- ceed with the examination, and insinuating his opin- ion that if the major took it, it would "be altered when it comes to corte." February 17th following, the magistrate entered at court a complaint against Swan " for a high contempt of authority and endeav- oring to hinder him in the execution of his office as magistrate, and casting abominable, wicked reflec- tions upon him to ye high defamation of his name." But Swan's sons avenged the public upon him. They appear to have had a feud with Wainwright, for

1941

HAVERHILL.

Samuel, tbe son, was, in 1690, tried, convicted and sent to jail for wantonly stabbing Capt. Simon Wain- wright's valuable horse with a half-pike. The testi- mony of Samuel Ingalls is worth reproducing as a matter of justice to old Swan, and illustrative of the parental discipline of that day. He says : "I and Samuel Swan was at work together in the field of Robert Swan, Jun., and Goodman Swan, Sen., came to us and asked us to goe into the hous with him, and then he asked Sam'l why he stabbed Mr. Wain- wright's horse. Samuel said nothing. Then said his father to him what is the reason yo dee wickedly in sinning against God in abusing the dum creature, and his father was so grievd at it yt he weped, and then he said I am resolved I will give you coreksion, and then he pulled off his close to his shirt and took a stick as big as a good ordinary nailing rod, and then he took Sam'l by one hand and streek him as hard as he cable to strike and streek him many blows. His father was a considerable while beating him and Samuel cryed out and beged of his father vari much yt he would heat him no more."

Simon Wainwright, as we have seen, came to Haver- hill in 1683, and six years later he seems to have had a valuable orchard.

It may be noted, as an indication of advancing taste and au appreciation of something besides absolute necessity, that in 1676, the selectmen were ordered to remove the pound from the burying-ground to a "more suitable and convenient place."

The town, apparently, was not called upon to sup- pert any poor or unprovided person until 1671-72, when Robert Emerson and his wife brought to the annual meeting the orphan child of Richard and Hannah Mercer, and desired the town to take care of it and also pay them for nursing it above a year past. The townsmen listened to their cries, seconded, per- haps, by the child's, and ordered the selectmen to "pro- vide for it and pay Robert Emerson what they should find due him ; also, to address the County Court next at Salisbery to have order from them and connsel how to dispose of the said child, and maintain the same."

The second centenarian, Richard Singletary, died October 25, 1687, aged one hundred and two years.

In 1666 occurred perhaps the first in Haverhill of a class of offenses with which the Puritans conten- ded in vain-the County Court fined John Barnard and his wife for incontinence; of course, before mar- riage. The man was fined three pounds, and the woman four shillings.

It has been truly said that the dreariest period in the history of New England was the period between 1684 and 1688. On the 18th of June in the former year a decree in the High Chancery Court of Eng- land annulled the charter of Massaehsetts. In Feb- ruary, 1685, Charles the Second died of a stroke of apoplexy. His successor, James the Second, con_ ceived the idea of uniting all the American govern- ments, as far as possible, under a single head. Very

able American jurists have been of the opinion, studying the case calmly after nearly two hundred years, that the decree in Chancery was not legally effective to forfeit the charter. It made no difference ; the colony was not in position to contest it. The news that the charter was condemned filled the colony with gloom. May 12, 1686, the last election according to the provisions of the charter took place. May, 14, the " Rose" frigate arrived in Boston with news that Joseph Dudley had been appointed presi- dent of a provisional government, which included Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine and the King's provinces. December 19, 1686, arrived at Boston as permanent Governor, Sir Edmund Andros, whose name and memory are profoundly hated in New Eng- land, and whose administration, under the control of the gloomy and bigoted James, is by the modern writers called " The Usurpation of Andros." Andros proceeded upon the assumption that, by the resump- tion of the charter, all government was annulled. He said; "there is no such thing as a town in the whole country." He levied a tax of twenty pence on each poll and one penny in the pound upon "all the late colonies and provinces toward defraying the public charges of government." Some towns asked to be excused from paying the tax ; others refused. Haver- hill, Salisbury, Rowley and Andover were fined for disobedience. In September, 1688, a special Justice's Court was ordered to "make inquiry in the several towns of Gloster, Haverhill and Boxford, and examine and bind over such persens as have been factious and seditious there and contemptnously re- fused to obey and execute the warrants of the Treasurer." Simon Wainwright, of Haverhill, who had made twenty barrels of cider from his own orchard in 1688, had twenty-five barrels taken from him by Andros' excise officers. It appears that the town had not appointed a commissioner to meet at the shire-town to assist in making rates for the county ; wherefore Onesiphorous Mash (Marsh), the town constable, was obliged to give bond and pay a fee of five pounds, three shillings, to some officer, that he would appear and answer at Salem. Daniel Brad- ley, a selectman, was compelled to pay five pounds one shilling, for a similar bond, on the same account. Our poor but thrifty fathers complained bitterly and with reason that they were obliged to pay illegal and unheard-of fees during Andros' short-lived gov- ernment.

In this time of distress a fresh Indian war broke out at the Eastward, fomented by the intrigues of the French. In November, 1688, Andros organized a force of seven or eight hundred men, and marched into the Eastern country. He built several forts, but found no enemy. For this expedition Joseph Emer- son and Jacob Whiticker were drafted from Haver- hill, on their return making depositions concerning abuse and maltreatment before their townsman, Na- thaniel Saltonstall, as assistant.

1942

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

Samuel Ayer, constable, writing to the General Court, under date of February 11, 1689, in answer to a citation requiring the town to appear and an- swer to the charge of " withholding one-half their pro- portion of rates," says: "I pray you consider our poor condition. There are many that have not corn to pay their rates ; many more that have not money ; to strain (distrain) I know not what to take; We are a great way from any market, to make money of anigh thing we have, and now there is not anigh way to transport to other places. I pray you consider our poor condition."

April 4, 1689, came the glorious news that William, Prince of Orange, had landed in England. April 18th the people in Boston were all alive. In the south end the cry was that the north enders were all in arms; and in the north end the same story about the south end flew from lip to lip. The people who ran to arms seized Randolph and others obnoxious to them : old Simon Bradstreet, the last Governor under the charter, and such of the former assistants as were at hand, were brought to the Council chamber, whith- er Andros, most unwillingly, was conducted to be informed that he was deposed. A revolution was ac- complished. On the 20th a provisional Council was organized, which called a convention of two delegates from each town. May 9, 1689, sixty-six delegates met. The convention invited the old officers to re- sume government, which they declined to do. A new convention was then called for May 22d, at which fifty-four towns were represented. This convention repeating the request of the former, the old governor and officers resumed their former places and every- thing went on tranquilly.

May 26th came the eagerly-welcomed news of the accession of William and Mary.

Haverhill made the following answer to the invi- tation to attend the second Convention.

"IIAVERHILL, May 20, 1689.

" By an express from ye Council for safety, etc., dated May ye 10th, 1689, The town being meet, do unanimously, nemine contradicente, declare yt they think it most eligible and safe to wait for information from ye Crown in England, according to promise and declaration, 60 yt we may ye better know wt we may at present do: and do pray yt ye Council, now in being for safety of ye people and Conservation of Peace, do take care effectively in all publique affairs and is all imergences. And we do hereby further declare yt we will be assistant in ye chargee yt shall come unto, both wh our persons and estates, 80 yt ye persons that are, or shall he, put into hold be effectually secured and have not too full a libertie of visitors, either made or Remade, whereby they muy escape, we we hear bath heen attempted.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Essex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 231

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1672

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1672