USA > Massachusetts > Franklin County > Leyden > History of Leyden, Massachusetts, 1676-1959 > Part 4
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The actual Newcomb-Hunt record is found on page 140 of the John Bearse Newcomb genealogy. It reads:
"Jerusha, daughter of Daniel Newcomb, b. Nov. 3, 1771 in Leyden where she married in 1788 Captain Charles Hunt born in Leyden March 18, 1763. He was a teacher for many years."
The fact that Charles Hunt was born in Leyden in 1763 points to the probability that his parents, Samuel and Hannah (Clark) Hunt were among the first to return to Leyden in the second settlement period. It is probable, too, that Daniel New- comb, came back with them, for the Newcomb genealogy states that Daniel "settled in what is now the town of Leyden soon after his majority, upon the home lot, the same upon which he, and all his children were born."
During 1764 the first evidence of settlement on Leyden's eastern hills was recorded in the following deed unearthed at the Franklin Registry:
"1764, Sept. 28, Moses Belding & Elizabeth Chamber- lain of Hinsdale, N. H. for 14 lbs. 14 shillings, paid by Michael Frizzell of Bernardston, and Reuben Frizzell of Hinsdale . .. House Lot 73, 1st Division, in the Fourth Year of His Majesty's Reign."
According to the Frizzell genealogy, Reuben and Michael were the sons of Samuel Frizzell who first settled in Shrewsbury, Mass. He moved to Fall Town with his family during the French and Indian wars.
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Miss Elizabeth Bagg, a descendant of the Leyden Frizzell family and an alumnae officer of Wesleyan University, says the original Frizzell name came from Normandy where the first member of the family was knighted "William des Fraseau" by William the Conqueror. This honor was bestowed in return for a bowl of delicious wild strawberries which Fraseau had given the hungry and thirsty monarch. The name soon evolved to Frazier when descendants of "Strawberry William" removed to Scotland. From this area they emigrated to America.
In 1763, Michael had holdings in the southeastern corner of Fall Town, but these soon were sold to the prominent citizen-to- be, Elisha Burnham. It is likely that Michael, with his brother Reuben, moved to East Hill in Leyden late in '64 and began clearing land. Reuben had acquired property about half way up the steep Couch Brook Road (lot 166, third division), and on a level spot near the brook, erected the first frame house in Leyden. Michael later built at the top of the hill, south of the road. The "widow Frizzell" who is said "to have formed the first settlement on Frizzell Hill," probably was the mother of Michael and Reuben. She is known to have been a remarkably capable woman, and doubtless took matters in hand when she came to Leyden with her two sons.
With the danger of Indian attack passed, the pioneers of Leyden became less cautious. Roads which had kept to the hill- tops, now were laid along brooks and valleys. Hence, when the Frizzells entered the Leyden picture in 1764, they put in a bid for a town road the entire length of the historic Couch Brook. Shortly after this, we find in the local town records: "Road from James Couch's to Michael Frizzel's Lot #73, confirmed."
The year 1765 was a year of expansion, a year of prepara- tion, a year of transition. In three years the township had nearly doubly its population. According to the "Lost Census of 1765" there were then 40 families in Fall Town: 54 males, 53 females, 123 children and 38 houses.
And with this growth, a change of "politics" was slowly brewing in the minds of the colonists. It may be remembered that King George III came to power shortly after the close of the French and Indian wars. No longer needing the Colonists to fight his enemies, the British king began to put pressure on the Americans. Trade with nations other than British was forbid- den; taxes were raised. The hated Stamp Act was passed in the Spring of '65. As New Englanders were forbidden to trade with
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the sugar-producing West Indies, the spirit of Yankee indepen- dence came to life. Pioneers, particularly in the Leyden area, got to work on the manufacture of their own sugar. Samuel Cun- nabell, whose fort stood at the eastern approaches to Leyden, took matters in hand and before the Spring had ended, claimed a sugaring business of his own.
The Pioneer Maple Sugar Story: It is a fact known to com- paratively few that the inhabitants of the Leyden area were among the first to make maple products to any great extent. In 1765, "Dodsley's Register," a British periodical, recorded that a method of making sugar and molasses from the sap of a cer- tain tree called the Maple had been discovered and put into practice at several points in New England, but especially in Bernardston, twenty miles from Athol. According to the Lieu- tenant-Governor Cushman papers, English periodicals added to the local maple sugaring reputation when, in a rare anecdote, Samuel Cunnabell was credited with the enigmatic distinction of "gathering sap in a basket and boiling it in a tub."
Before 1765, the Colonists had been slow to imitate the In- dians in sugar making. Except in remote districts, the white man bought muscovado or low grade cane sugar from the Spanish and French Indies. While the Indian preferred his maple sugar because "it tasted more of the forest," the white man referred, somewhat condescendingly, to Indian sweetening as "Indian sugar and melasses."
It wasn't till the close of the French and Indian wars that the Reverend Samuel Hopkins of Springfield, with an eye to the future perhaps, suggested that "it would be prudent for Colonial farmers to spare their maple trees, and utilize them in supply- ing themselves with their own sugar."
Before this time, settlers who had ventured to make maple products had employed odd methods. One man cut small branches from his maples, then tied bottles to the dripping twigs and waited for the sun to distil the sap as it flowed into the translucent containers! Another, bored gimlet holes in his trees and inserted goose quills to draw off the liquid from sap reservoirs cut, six inches deep, in the tree trunk above. All set their catch buckets on the ground, Indian style. These were either hollowed-out basswood chunks or "birchen baskets." It wasn't till late in the 18th century that the hanging bucket was invented and eight-inch spigots of elder and sumac put into use. It wasn't till 1790 that state agriculturists recommended
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auger tapping in place of the old and injurious method of "axe- tapping.“
When Dodsley's Register inferred that a new method of sugar making had been discovered in New England during the 1760's, the editors doubtless referred to the Yankee method of boiling sap directly over the fire in contrast to the Indian method of "hot stone boiling." To be sure this "new" method of kettle boiling had its advantages, but 'tis said the syrup was often dark and scorched tasting, with ashes, leaves and smoke adding to the flavor. However, after some of the dirt and twigs had been strained out through mats of hemlock boughs, the resulting "me- lasses" was quite palatable!
In the case of Samuel Cunnabell's sugar-making processes, we find that during a great moment in American history he combined Indian sugaring methods with early Yankee methods and added a brand new sugaring element all his own.
Samuel Cunnabell, like his cousin, John, (who later settled on Frizzell Hill) was an inventive man. It is said he built his stockaded house with a trap door leading from his parlor through an underground escape route to John Burk's Fort - just in case the Indians ever got too much for him. And long before his maple sugar innovations, he devised, with his daughter's help, a water-powered spinning wheel. When the Stamp Act came along and the sugar cane ports were blockaded by King George, Cunnabell got to work with his "basket and his tub."
The explanation to this seeming impossibility, according to one historian, was that sap was gathered in a basket when frozen, then boiled in a tub. Another concluson is that during intervals of peace, Cunnabell picked up the Indian tricks of sugaring, including the art of making sap-tight, birch bark ves- sels; that he collected his sap, frozen or unfrozen, in these buckets, or birch baskets, as they were often called. An official Maine record states that as late as 1862 sugar-makers in that area were collecting sap in such baskets.
In a brief paragraph, Lt .- Gov. Cushman explains just how Cunnabell made use of his boiling tub. "Like most pioneers of his day," Cushman recounts, "Samuel Cunnabell owned a large potash kettle, conical in shape, but shallow. His ingenuity suggested that greater depth might be acquired by putting a tub atop his kettle; so procuring a tub with "ears" to it through which a handle could be inserted, he removed the bottom, placed the tub within the kettle and firmly packed the two
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together. When this combination was suspended over an open fire from an improvised crane of crotched sticks, he was ready "to boil sap in a tub."
Thus was born Sam Cunnabell's famous sugaring contrap- tion. Nor was this purely a local innovation. Longer and longer the shadows of war were lengthening over the land, and colon- ists everywhere were turning to the production of essentials from native sources. Echoing Cunnabell's sugaring "philoso- phy," a patriot wrote: "Those who have maple trees will not neglect their sugar-making which is not only the most welcome and pleasant sweetening, but being the product of our own country will ever have preference by every true American."
So it was that Fall Town's Samuel Cunnabell with his old potash kettle, set tub and birchen baskets, did, in a way, pro- claim his own Declaration of Independence - sugarwise - a good ten years before the shots at Concord Bridge echoed round. the world.
The Florida Grant on Hoosac Mountain: It already has been pointed out, in references to the 1752 and 1753 petitions, that the original northern boundary of Fall Town extended over the present Massachusetts-Vermont line; that when the official boundary survey was made in 1741, it chopped off a good deal of land formerly belonging to Fall Town proprietors. At the time of the survey, the land north of the Massachusetts line belonged to New Hampshire, since Vermont did not come into being until 1777.
The territory lost to New Hampshire was nearly a mile wide in eastern Fall Town but tapered down to a narrow strip in the western, or Leyden, section. Even so, we find that the 50-acre Beaver Meadow lot #97 sold by John Hunt to Hezekiah Chapin, was whittled down to 15 acres by the 1741 survey.
To compensate Fall Town proprietors for lands lost in this manner, frequent petitions were addressed to the General Court in Boston. It was not until June 25, 1765 that the Court confirmed a grant of 7350 acres "to the Proprietors who had lost land taken off by running the Line between Massachusetts and New Hampshire." The new grant was not in a neighboring township, however. It was located forty miles to the west of Fall Town, atop the Mohawk Trail on Hoosac Mountain!
On October 17, 1765, the proprietors voted to "lay out the Grant on Hoosuc Mt." because there was not enough land to go around in the original Grant. In the State Archives there is:
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a plan of this survey dated October 21. This plan, like most early maps, shows no natural features at all. The survey begins "at a Birch Tree" in the northwest corner, runs 1222 rods south to a "Hemlock," then east 960 rods to a "stake and stones," then 1222 rods north to a "Spruce Tree," then 960 rods west to "place of beginning." As a help in locating the Florida Grant, this plan might just as well have been made of a plot in the Antipodes!
In 1793, a tax of one and a half pence per acre was levied on Hoosac Mountain land "for the purpose of making a road across the Grant." The proposed road was, without a doubt, part of the famous Mohawk Trail which now carries hundreds of thousands of tourists over Whitcomb Summit each summer.
One direct Leyden tie-in with the Florida Grant is a high spruce-covered peak, nearly 3000 feet above sea level, just north of Whitcomb's Summit. Today this elevation is known as Crumb Hill. It was named for Leyden's Dickensey character, Phineus Crumb, who, after clearing a homestead in West Ley- den, trekked into the wilds of Florida's Hoosac mountains and settled near the hill which bears his name.
Leyden also is represented on Hoosac Mountain by colorful murals at Florida's "Trail Top Inn" depicting scenes along the trail of the Deerfield captives. These scenes, some of which have a Leyden background, were painted by Arthur N. Fuller, son of Henry Kirke Brown's best friend.
The Controversial and Hitherto Unexplained Boston Town- ship Grant Given to the Proprietors of Fall Town: One week after the Florida Grant was laid out, a meeting was proposed for laying out another Fall Town Grant known as the Colrain Gore. As far back as 1736, the proprietors of Fall Town had agitated for more land. In 1740, the soldier-surveyor, Thomas Wells, was sent to Boston with a petition requesting "a gore of land lying between the Township of Fall Town and Boston Township #2 above Deerfield." This grant was allowed; yet little or nothing was done about surveying the area.
Until recently, it was assumed that the Colrain Gore lay entirely on the west side of Green River; but that did not ac- count for the strip of land lying between Green River and the western boundary of Fall Town grant. This strip is clearly shown in that excellent history, "The Vermont Story." On an early map of the Leyden area, the western boundary of "Fall Fight Town" is shown well east of Green River, with Boston Township #2 covering the lands between the river and the Fall
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Fight Town line. This portion of the "Gore" now takes in Ley- den Center and all of West Leyden. The map in the front of the book shows, approximately, the boundaries of the "Colrain Gore."
Early reference to inhabitants in the "Gore" is found in a 1764 Fall Town record which stipulates that "people living in the Gore do their own work on the road running through said Gore." The road was doubtless the highway laid out from Deer- field to Colrain in 1741. It ran through the "Gore" on the west side of Green River. Zebulon Allen of Fall Town was appointed surveyor of this road when it was re-established in 1763, after the wars.
The people living in the Gore as early as 1765 were those who had been granted isolated homesteads by the General Court. The names of Hubbard, Calf, Dr. Bolton and Nuberry appear in early "Gore" records as holders of large farms near the river. The Nuberry farm was laid out as early as November 23, 1753.
The first legal document relating to the Colrain Gore in Boston Township #2 is dated October 25, 1765 and is addressed to Major Elijah Williams of Deerfield. This record reads: "We, the subscribers, proprietors of a Tract of Land called the Gore, adjoining to Fall Town in the County of Hampshire, Bounded east on the original Grant, West on Colrain, South on Deerfield, North on the Province Line, desire that you would issue a war- rant to the Proprietors [of Fall Town] on the First Tuesday in Jan'y Next for a meeting to be held at the house of David Hoit, Innholder, at one O'clock to choose a moderator, clerk and treasurer. Sd Prop's to agree upon some method for laying out said Land to Each Prop. his part, and to raise any sums of money which may be necessary to defray charges which shall arise & do anything that may be necessary to lay out and settle said land ... " The document was signed by Thomas Williams, the Rev. Jonathan Ashley, Jon'n Ashley, Jr., Bridget Bert and Joseph Barnard. It is interesting to note that the house where this first "Gore" meeting was held was the famed "Old Indian House" on Deerfield Common.
As far as is known, the above is the first definite record which proves that Leyden originally was divided into two dis- tinct parts; that the western section was not settled till many years after the eastern section was laid out.
The minister's rate for February 1765 lists the following
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settlers in East Leyden and its approaches: Major John Burk, Daniel Chapin, Samuel Cunnabell, Captain Michael Frizzell, Joshua Wells and Lieutenant Daniel Newcomb. Across Green River, on the west side, John Bolton, Abraham Peck and John Workman are listed as owners of isolated farmsteads. There is no indication of settlers in West Leyden at this time.
During the year 1766, a slow, but steady development is noted in the Township. Time after time, settlers had been misled into believing war was over, so they moved into the wilderness, inch by inch, taking nothing for granted. On Jan. 16th, Oliver Brewster, of Mayflower descent, purchased for 27 shillings Lot 54 on Leyden's East Hill. Brewster, like Leyden's other pioneers, came from Lebanon, Connecticut.
On January 7th, further business toward the development of the 7000-acre Gore tract was put through when it was voted that Ebenezer Sheldon, Aaron Field and Remembrance Sheldon sur- vey and make a plan of it. It also was voted to levy a tax of 6 shillings (about $1.25) on each right, to defray the charges for the survey.
On February 14, a Fall Town meeting was held "to see if the town will lay out a road to the West part of Town & do something towards clearing the same." It also was voted to choose a Committee to determine the use of timber derived from clearing "the several roads in Town." Indicating that new roads were of chief concern at this time, March records for '66 tell of "20 days' work on the road to the West of Town and 12 days' work on the road through Colrain Gore, John Bolton surveyor." Other roads were laid out in Fall Town this year, but of chief interest to Leyden was the "road to the West part of town" - doubtless the original Couch Brook Road which was later to carry many of Leyden's "Revolutionary" settlers.
Even at this early date, there was a tang of rebellion in the air. King George, uncertain of his American subjects' loyalty, had sent red coats to Boston to keep an eye on the Colonists lest they show too much independence. The Stamp Act of the pre- vious year (proceeds from which were intended to pay for the support of the unwanted British soldiers) had been denounced by Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Adams. The latter gentleman, known as "The Father of the Revolution," was, years hence, to sign a document making Leyden a free and independent district.
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In 1767, while Governor Francis Bernard was being cen- sured in the Boston press for conniving with the King against the people, Samuel Adams, with other great patriots, was swearing he would "eat nothing, drink nothing, wear nothing" which had been imported from England. This attitude was reflected in New England's hill towns where Colonists were determined to strike out "on their own."
On Leyden's eastern approaches, the year was marked by the completion of the first town highway, the first grist mill and the first frame house.
Research has proved that the saw mill lot (176a, third divi- sion) was near the chasm where the Deerfield captives passed over the Couch Brook on a single unsteady log. Proving that the mill was a reality, it is recorded in 1767 that "Samuel Cun- nabell be allowed 18 shillings for getting plank for the bridge below his mill and laying same on the Couch Brook Bridge." West of this site, the records show that Hezekiah Newcomb, forebear of the Leyden Newcombs, had established himself by 1767, and in the same records we find the notation that "Reuben Frizel was voted 2 shillings for work done on the road to his house." This is the first reference to any house in Leyden - the first frame house on the hill named for the Frizzell family. The road to which reference is made doubtless was the first town road running "to the west part of town."
Now this pioneer road - the Couch Brook Road - and the first Leyden frame house were more than pioneer accomplish- ments per se: They marked the skeleton beginnings of what was later to become part of the famed Dorrilite Colony - a strange renegade sect organized by William Dorril, one-time British prisoner in Yankee irons!
The Year 1768: As the west part of the Township became populated, the inhabitants, particularly in the "Gore," felt that their convenience should be consulted in regard to the location of the church and meeting house. The first meeting house had been erected in 1739 on eastern Fall Town's highest point and was intended to serve the religious needs of the entire town- ship. But because of the rough travel between the east and west sections of the town, and the distance involved, those in the west wanted the meeting house near them; those in the east wanted it to stay where it was. Evidence that Leyden wanted the church on its "middle grounds" is borne out on one of the early maps where "Ministry Lot" is marked on a spot just off the
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Old Proprietor's Road on a high rocky hillock near Eden Trail (see map).
After appointing an "unbiased" committee to decide the question of the meeting house location, it was moved (in 1768) one half mile south of its original site on Huckle Hill, under the direction of the ubiquitous, Samuel Cunnabell, and with the added help of "a barrel of rum furnished at the Town's expense."
This did not settle the question for the churchgoers who lived on the far side of Green River. A petition was therefore sent to the Governor of the State. It read:
"For years now we labor under very difficult cir- cumstances, by reason of being at such a distance from the meeting house which is not less than 14 miles from the nearest of us, and then we are obliged to go in a round about way through Shelburne and Greenfield . . . and your petitioners would further inform your Honours that it is impossible to get a road any other way by reason of a large river with very high banks on both sides, and the water, many times in the year so high it is impossible to get a road over .
This petition, which concluded with a plea for annexation to the town of Colrain, was signed by the pioneer settlers of the Colrain Gore. These were: John Workman, George Clark, An- drew Henry, David Morris, Andrew Lucas, Robert Riddle, Abraham Peck and William Stewart. Others listed as "Gore" residents about this time included John Newell, John Bolton, Thomas Shearer, Wm. Nelson, John Matthews and an old colored man named Remus.
Emphasizing the fact that the petition was overdrawn, the defense pointed out that the "River and Hills were not repre- sented in a true light: That the river was not so large but a tree would reach across it, and a Bridge be made to stand on 'said River; and that the Banks and Hills were passable in some places." This latter statement bears out our belief that a scout path or bridle way had been opened over the hills of West Leyden during the French and Indian wars. This roadway, which linked the frontier forts, may have grown up considerably after the conclusion of the war, but apparently, in 1768, was still "passable in some places."
The defense brought up another interesting point in connec- tion with the Colrain petition. Annexation of the "Gore" to Col-
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rain, they said, would very much hurt, if not spoil, the chance of having another parish in the west, or Leyden section of the town. This prediction came true when all the families living in the Colrain Gore turned to the Colrain church and those in the. east part of town went to the church on Huckle Hill. Leyden, half way between, was left without any nearby place of worship, and this lack strongly influenced its religious tendencies during the formative years; and may well be the reason for the accept- ance, by many of Leyden's early inhabitants of the strange creed of William Dorril.
1769 - Early School Records: The Reverend John Robinson, pastor of the Leiden Pilgrims in Holland, charged the members of his flock to "build churches, read the Bible without sectarian prejudice and establish schools."
In Fall Town, the first proposal for a school system was in 1769, and the following year, the sum of two pounds was ap- propriated for school teaching in private homes. One such school was at the home of Samuel Cunnabell near the Couch Brook.
In 1771, there were 90 children in town in want of schooling, and one shilling and four pence (about $.33) were allowed each child for a year's instruction. Girls from 6 to 12, and boys from 6 to 16 were considered as "schoolars."
The entire township was divided into five school districts, four in the east and one for "those people in ye west part of ye town to be located where they agree." That this location was in the Leyden area is substantiated by the Dec. 20, 1773 record in which it is recorded that "all the schoolars at Beaver Meadow and Frizzell Hill go to one school." It also was stipulated that those "schoolars" joining on Colrain be allowed money for schooling.
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