USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Saugus > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 14
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Nahant > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 14
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynnfield > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 14
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Swampscott > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 14
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynn > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 14
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64
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It was placed in a small hollow, that it might be better sheltered from the winds, and was partly sunk into the earth, being en- tered by descending several steps.
In the General Court, 9 May, " A proposition was made by the people that every company of trained men might choose their own captain and officers ; but the Governor, giving them reasons to the contrary, they were satisfied without it."
On the 14th of June, as Capt. Richard Wright was returning from the eastward, in a vessel, with about eight hundred dollars' worth of goods on board, one of the crew, when off Portsmouth, proceeded to light his pipe; but was requested to desist, as there was a barrel of powder on board. He replied that he should " take one pipe if the devil carried him away." The boat and the man, says Winthrop, were presently blown to pieces ; but the rest of the crew, though some of them were drunk and asleep, escaped.
Governor Winthrop, in his journal, 14 Aug. remarks: " This week they had, in barley and oats, at Sagus, about twenty acres good corn, and sown with the plough."
On the 4th of September, Richard Hopkins, of Watertown, was arraigned for selling a gun and pistol, with powder and shot, to Montowampate, the Lynn sagamore. The sentence of the Court was that he should " be severely whippt, and branded with a hot iron on one of his cheekes." One of the Saugus Indians gave the information, on promise of concealment, for his discovery would have exposed him to the resentment of his tribe.
Capt. Nathaniel Turner was chosen, by the General Court, " constable of Saugus for this year, and till a new be chosen."
[The Court order that Sarah Morley be " putt as an appren- tice to M' Nathaniel Turner, of Saugus, for the space of nyne yeares, from this Court, for wch tearme he is to finde her meate, drinke & clothing."]
In consequence of a suspicion that the Indians were conspir- ing the destruction of the whites, the neighboring sagamores were called before the Governor on the 14th of September. The readiness with which they appeared, evinced their friendly disposition.
Mr. Bachiler had been in the performance of his pastoral duties about four months, when a complaint was made of some irregularities in his conduct. He was arraigned before the Court at Boston, on the 3d of October, when the following order was passed : " Mr. Bachiler is required to forbeare exer- cising his giftes as a pastor or teacher publiquely in our Pattent, unlesse it be to those he brought with him, for his contempt of authority, and until some scandles be removed." This was the commencement of a series of difficulties which agitated the unhappy church for several years.
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October 3. "It is ordered, that Saugus plantation shall have liberty to build a ware upon Saugus Ryver also they have prom- ised to make and continually to keepe a goode foote bridge, upon the most convenient place there." This wear was chiefly built by Thomas Dexter, for the purpose of taking bass and alewives, of which many were dried and smoked for shipping. It crossed the river near the Iron Works. The bridge was only a rude structure of timber and rails.
" It is further ordered, that no person shall take any tobacco publiquely, under pain of punishment; also that every one shall pay one penny for every time he is convicted of taking tobacco in any place."
On the second of November, a vessel, commanded by Captain Pierce, and loaded with fish, of which Mr. John Humfrey was part owner, was wrecked off Cape Charles, and twelve men drowned.
November 7. "It is ordered that the Captaines shall train their companyes but once a monethe."
" It is referred to Mr. Turner, Peter Palfrey, and Roger Co- nant, to sett out a proportion of land in Saugus for John Hum- frey, Esqr." This land was laid out at Swampscot. Mr. Turner was also one of the committee to settle a difference respecting the boundary line between Cambridge and Charlestown.
In the month of December, a servant girl, in the family of the Rev. Samuel Skelton, of Salem, coming to see her friends at Lynn, lost her way, and wandered seven days. Mr. Winthrop says, " All that time she was in the woods, having no kind of food, the snow being very deep, and as cold as at any time that winter. She was so frozen into the snow some mornings, as she was one hour before she could get up." Mr. Wood says, " The snow being on the ground at first, she might have trackt her own footsteps back again; but wanting that understanding, she wandered, till God, by his speciall Providence brought her backe to the place she went from, where she lives to this day."
1633.
In the month of January, this year, Poquanum, the sagamore of Nahant was unfortunately killed. Several vessels having been to the eastward in search of some pirates, stopped on their return at Richmond's Isle, near Portland, where they found " Black William," whom they hanged in revenge for the murder of Walter Bagnall, who had been killed by the Indians, on the 3d of October, 1631. Mr. Winthrop says that Bagnall " was a wicked fellow, and had much wronged the Indians." .It is not certain that Poquanum had any concern in his death; on the contrary, Governor Winthrop tells us that he was killed by " Squidraysett and his Indians." Thus terminated the existence
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of a chief who had welcomed the white men, and bestowed ben- efits on them.
In the course of a few months, Mr. Bachiler had so. far suc- ceeded in regaining the esteem of the people, that the Court, on the 4th of March, removed their injunction that he should not preach in the colony, and left him at liberty to resume the per- formance of his public services.
At the same Court, Mr. Thomas Dexter was ordered to " be set in the bilbowes, disfranchised, and fined X£ for speaking reproachful and seditious words against the government here established." The bilbows were a kind of stocks, like those in which the hands and feet of poor Hudibras were confined.
" The Knight
And brave squire from their steeds alight, At the outer wall, near which there stands A Bastile, made to imprison hands, By strange enchantment made to fetter The lesser parts, and free the greater."
[Another error in transcribing occurred here. The fine of Mr. Dexter was forty pounds instead of ten; a fact which goes still further to show that the offence was regarded as of great enormity, and that fractious people some times found the luxury of railing at the government an expensive one. At this blessed day of liberty things are different. The fine of Mr. Dexter was not promptly paid, however. And some years afterward, to wit, in 1638, the larger part was remitted, the record standing thus : " 4 Mich, Thom: Dexter being fined 401. there was 301. of it remited him." (Col. Recs.)]
One of those elegant and commodious appendages of the law - the bilbows -was placed near the meeting-house; where it stood the terror and punishment of all such evil doers as spoke against the government, chewed tobacco, or went to sleep in a sermon two hours long. However censurable Mr. Dexter may have been, his punishment was certainly dispro- portioned to his fault. To be deprived of the privileges of a freeman, to be exposed to the ignominy of the stocks, and to be amerced in a fine of more than forty dollars, [40].] show that the magistrates were greatly incensed by his remarks. If every man were to be set in the bilbows, who speaks against govern- ment, in these days, there would scarcely be trees enough in Lynn woods to make stocks of. The magistrates of those days had not acquired the lesson, which their successors have long since learned, that censure is the tax which public men must pay for their adventitious greatness. [But so ravenously fond are most people of position, that they are ready enough to pay the tax for the enjoyment of the privilege.]
On the fourth of March, Mr. Nathaniel Turner was chosen
1
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by the General Court, "Captaine of the military company att Saugus."
Captain Turner gave ten pounds " towards the sea fort," built for the defense of Boston harbor. Capt. Richard Wright gave " 400 feet 4 inch planke," for the same purpose.
Mr. Edward Howe was fined twenty shillings, " for selling stronge waters, contrary to order of Court."
[The nineteenth of June was " appoyncted to be kept as a day of publique thanksgiueing throughout the seval plantacons."]
At a town meeting on the twelfth of July, the inhabitants made a grant to Mr. Edward Tomlins, of a privilege to build a corn mill, at the mouth of the stream which flows from the Flax pond, where Chase's mill now stands.
This was the second mill in the colony, the first having been built at Dorchester, the same year. [For the correction of an error as to the location of the first mill in Lynn, see page 128.] At this time, the pond next above the Flax pond was partly a meadow; and some years after a dam was built and the pond raised by Edward Tomlins, from whom it was called Tomlins's pond. In reference to this mill, we find the following testimonies, given 3 June, 1678, in the Essex Registry of Deeds.
"I, George Keaser, Aged about 60 yeare, doe testifie, that being at a Towne meetinge in Linne meeting house many years agoe, mr. Edward Tomlins made complaint then to the Towne of Linne, that there was not water enough in the great pond next to the Towne of Linne to serve the mill to grind theire grist in the sumer time, and he desired leave of the Towne to make a dam in the upper pond to keep a head of water against the height of sumer time, that soe he might have a suply of water to Grind their Grist in the drought of sum- er. And the Towne of linne granted him his request, that he would make a dam there, where the old trees lay for a bridge for all people to goe over, insteed of a bridg."
" This I, Clement Coldam, aged about 55 years, doe testifie, that the grant of the old mill was in July ye 12, 1633, to Edward Tomlins, which was the second mill in this colony ; and after the Towne saw that the mill could not supply the Towne, they gave leave to build an overshoot mill upon the same - water; with a sluice called by the name of the old sluce, being made by Mr. Howell, the second owner of the mill ; and then Mr. Howell did sell the same mill to John Elderkin ; and John Elderkin did sell it to mr. Bennet, and mr. Bennet did sell it to Goodman Wheeler, and Goodman Wheeler sould it to John Ballard, and John Ballard sold it to Henry Rhodes. And this I testifie that the water to supply the mill with, was granted to the mill, before any Meddow in the Towne was granted to any man, wee mowing all comon then. And this I testifie, that I kept the key of the old sluce for mr. South, which is since about 27 or 28 yeares agoe."
Edward Richards testified that Mr. Tomlins " was not to stop or hinder the alewives to go up to the great pond."
The following description of ancient Saugus and Nahant is extracted from "Nevy Englands Prospect," written this year . by William Wood of Lynn, and which he says was undertaken, " because there hath been many scandalous and false reports
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past upon the country, even from the sulphurous breath of every base ballad monger."
" The next plantation is Saugus, sixe miles northeast from Winnesimet. This Towne is pleasant for situation, seated in the bottom of a Bay, which is made on one side with the surrounding shore, and on the other with a long, sandy Beach. This sandy beach is two miles long at the end, whereon is a necke of land called Nahant. It is sixe miles in circumference, well wooded with Oakes, Pines and Cedars. It is beside, well watered, having beside the fresh Springs, a great Pond in the middle, before which is a spacious Marsh. In this necke is store of good ground, fit for the Plow; but for the present it is only used for to put young Cattle in, and weather Goates, and Swine, to secure them from the Woolues; a few posts and rayles, from the low water markes to the shore, keepes out the Woolves, and keepes in the Cattle. One Blacke William, an Indian Duke, out of his generosity, gave this place in gen- erall to this plantation of Saugus, so that no other can appropriate it to himselfe.
1
"Vpon the South side of the Sandy Beach, the Sea beateth, which is a true prognostication to presage stormes and foule weather, and the breaking up of the Frost. For when a storme hath been, or is likely to be, it will roare like Thunder, being heard sixe miles ; and after stormes casts up great stores of great Clammes, which the Indians, taking out of their shels, carry home in baskets. On the North side of this Bay is two great Marshes, which are made two by a pleasant River, which runnes between them. Northward up this river goes great store of Alewives, of which they make good Red Herrings; insomuch that they have been at charges to make them a wayre, and a Her- ring house to dry these Herrings in; the last year were dried some 4 or 5 Last [150 barrels] for an experiment, which proved very good; this is like to prove a great inrichment to the land, being a staple commodity in other Coun- tries, for there be such innumerable companies in every river, that I have seen ten thousand taken in two houres, by two men, without any weire at all saving a few stones to stop their passage up the river. There likewise come store of Basse, which the English and Indians catch with hooke and line, some fifty or three score at a tide. At the mouth of this river runnes up a great Creeke into that great Marsh, which is called Rumney Marsh, which is 4 miles long, and 2 miles broad, halfe of it being Marsh ground, and halfe upland grasse, without tree or bush; this Marsh is crossed with divers creekes, wherein lye great store of Geese and Duckes. There be convenient Ponds, for the planting of Duck coyes. Here is likewise belonging to this place, divers fresh Meddowes, which afford good grasse ; and foure spacious Ponds, like little Lakes, wherein is good store of fresh Fish, within a mile of the Towne; out of which runnes a curious fresh Broocke, that is seldom frozen, by reason of the warmnesse of the water; upon this stream is built a water Milne, and up this river come Smelts and frost fish, much bigger than a Gudgeon. For wood there is no want, there being store of good Oakes, Wallnut, Cedar, Aspe, Elme. The ground is very good, in many places without trees, and fit for the plough. In this place is more English tillage than in all New England and Virginia besides ; which proved as well as could be expected ; the corn being very good, especially the Barley, Rye and Oates.
.
"The land affordeth to the inhabitants as many varieties as any place else, and the sea more; the Basse continuing from the middle of April to Michael- mas [Sept. 29,] which stayes not half that time in the Bay [Boston Harbor;] besides, here is a great deal of Rock cod and Macrill, insomuch that shoales of Bass have driven up shoales of Macrill, from one end of the sandy Beach to the other; which the inhabitants have gathered up in wheelbarrows. The Bay which lyeth before the Towne, at a lowe spring tyde will be all flatts for two miles together ; upon which is great store of Muscle Banckes, and Clam banckes, and Lobsters amongst the rockes and grassie holes. These flatts
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make it unnavigable for shippes; yet at high water, great Boates, Loiters, [lighters] and Pinnaces of 20 and 30 tun, may saile up to the plantation ; but they neede have a skilful Pilote, because of many dangerous rockes and foam- ing breakers, that lye at the mouth of that Bay. The very aspect of the place is fortification enough to keepe of an unknowne enemie ; yet it may be fortified at little charge, being but few landing places thereabout, and those obscure."
Of the health of Lynn, Mr. Wood remarks: "Out of that Towne, from whence I came, in three years and a half, there died but three; to make good which losses, I have seene foure children Baptized at one time." Prefixed to his book is the following address, written by some one in England, who signs himself S. W. [Can the S. W. mean Samuel Whiting, the emi- nent divine, who came over in 1636, and soon settled as minis- ter of the church at Lynn -a man famed for his piety, learning, and affability ? It is possible that Mr. Wood's book induced his emigration ; and if so, it was the occasion of great good to the infant plantation. The Puritan clergy were much prone to bestow their encomiums in numbers, after this style.]
Thanks to thy travel and thyself, who hast Much knowledge in so small room comptly placed, And thine experience thus a mound dost make, From whence we may New England's prospect take, Though many thousands distant ; therefore thou Thyself shall sit upon mount praise her brow. For if the man who shall the short cut find Unto the Indies, shall for that be shrined, Sure thou deservest then no small praise who So short cut to New England here dost shew ; And if than this small thanks thou get'st no more Of thanks, I then will say, the world 's grown poor.
The " curious fresh broocke" which Mr. Wood notices, is Strawberry brook, which is kept warm by the numerous springs beneath the pond in which it originates, and by its constant flowing for the supply of several mills. Mr. Robert Mansfield, who lived near its source, told me that he had never seen it frozen for more than seventy years.
A tax, made by the General Court, on the first of October, will show the relative wealth of the several towns. The ap- portionment was, to Dorchester, 80 pounds ; to Boston, Charles- town, Cambridge, Watertown, and Roxbury, each, 48 pounds ; Lynn, 36; Salem, 28. At several assessments, Lynn was in advance of Salem.
Such great quantities of corn having been used for fattening swine, as to occasion a scarcity, the Court ordered, on the fifth of November, " That no man shall give his swine any corn, but such as, being viewed by two or three neighbors, shall be judged unfit for man's meat ; and every plantation may agree how many swine every person may keep."
The Court ordered, that every man, in each plantation, M 10
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excepting magistrates and ministers, should pay for three days' work, at one shilling and sixpence each, for completing the Fort in Boston harbor.
The ministers of Lynn and the western towns were in the practice of meeting at each other's houses, once in two weeks, to discuss important questions. The ministers of Salem were averse to the practice, fearing it might eventuate in the estab- lishment of a presbytery.
On the 4th of December, corresponding with the 15th of new style, the snow was " knee deep," and the rivers frozen.
The year 1633 was rendered memorable by the death of the three Indian sagamores. In January, Poquanum was murdered ; and in December, Wonohaquaham and Montowampate died. Governor Winthrop, in his journal, says :
"December 5. John Sagamore died of the small pox, and almost all his people ; above thirty buried by Mr. Maverick of Winnesemett in one day. The towns in the bay took away many of the children ; but most of them died soon after.
"James Sagamore of Sagus died also and most of his folks. John Saga- more desired to be brought among the English; so he was; and promised, if he recovered, to live with the English and serve their God. He left one son, which he disposed to Mr. Wilson, the pastor of Boston, to be brought up by him. He gave to the governor a good quantity of wampompeague, and to divers others of the English he gave gifts; and took order for the payment of his own debts and his men's. He died in a persuasion that he should go to the Englishmen's God. Divers of them, in their sickness, confessed that the Englishmen's God was a good God, and that if they recovered they would serve him. It wrought much with them, that when their own people forsook them, yet the English came daily and ministered to them; and yet few, only two families, took any infection by it. Amongst others Mr. Maverick, of Win- nesemett, is worthy of a perpetual remembrance. Himself, his wife and serv- ants, went daily to them, ministered to their necessities, and buried their dead, and took home many of their children. So did other of the neighbors."
· After the death of his brothers, Wenepoykin became sagamore of the remaining Indians in this region.
1634.
The inconvenience of having the Legislature composed of the whole number of freemen, and the danger of leaving the planta- tions exposed to the attacks of the Indians, induced the people to form a House of Representatives, who first assembled on the 14th of May. Eight towns were represented, each of which sent three representatives - Boston, Charlestown, Roxbury, Dorchester, Cambridge, Watertown, Lynn, and Salem. The representatives from Lynn, were Captain Nathaniel Turner, Edward Tomlins, and Thomas Willis. The General Court this year consisted of the Governor, Deputy Governor, six Assist- ants, and twenty-four Representatives. This number was not much increased for many years; each town sending fewer, rather than more representatives.
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Hon. JOHN HUMFREY, with his wife, the Lady Susan, a daugh- ter of the Earl of Lincoln, arrived in July. He brought with him a valuable present from Mr. Richard Andrews, an alderman of London, consisting of fifteen heifers, at this time valued at more than eighty dollars each. One of them was designed for each of the eight ministers, and the remainder were for the poor. He went to reside on his farm at Swampscot, which had been laid out by order of the Court. It consisted of five hun- dred acres, " between Forest river and the cliff." The bounds extended "a mile from the seaside," and ran "to a great white oak by the rock," including " a spring south of the oak." The spring is on Mr. Stetson's farm, [and the " old oak" stood about a furlong north of the spring. It was standing when the first edition of the History of Lynn appeared, and Mr. Lewis pleaded for it in these pathetic strains :
O spare the tree, whose dewy tears Have fallen for a thousand years ! Beneath whose shade, in days of old, The careful shepherd watched his fold; On whose green top the eagle sate, To watch the fish-hawk's watery weight ; And oft in moonlight by whose side, The Indian wooed his dusky bride ! It speaks to man of early time, Before the earth was stained with crime, Ere cannon waked the peaceful plains, When silence ruled her vast domains, O, as you love the bold and free. Spare, woodman, spare the old oak tree!
[In his second edition, the old oak having disappeared, Mr. Lewis tartly exclaims : " But, alas ! the old oak, the last of the ancient forest of Lynn, has been cut down. Some people have no sentiment."
[But it seems beyond dispute that Mr. Lewis was wrong in locating Mr. Humfrey in what is now Swampscot. He owned an extensive tract of land there, but resided, I am satisfied, on the east side of Nahant street, having, in that vicinity, quite au extensive farm, his windmill being on Sagamore Hill. See p. 201.
[Timothy Tomlins was appointed overseer of the " powder and shott. and all other amunicon," in the Saugus plantation.]
On the 3d of September, the Court ordered, " That Mr. Ed- ward Tomlins, or any other put in his place, by the Commis- sioners of War, with the help of an assistant, shall have power to presse men and carts, for ordinary wages, to helpe towards makeing of such carriages and wheeles as are wanting for the ordinances."
On training day, Captain Turner, by the direction of Colonel Humfrey, went with his company to Nahant, to hunt the wolves. This was very pleasant amusement for training day.
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1635.
Though an agreement had been made by Thomas Dexter with the Indian chief, for the proprietorship of Nahant, yet the town evidently regarded it as their property ; as will appear by the following extracts from the Town Records, preserved in the files of the General Court :
January 11. "It is also voted by the freemen of the towne, that these men underwritten shall have liberty to plant and build at Nahant, and shall possess each man land for the said purpose, and proceeding in the trade of fishing. Mr. Humfreys, Daniel How, Mr. Ballard, Joseph Rednap, Timothy Tomlins, Richard Walker, Thomas Talmage, Henry Feakes, Francis Dent."
January 18. "It is ordered by the freemen of the towne, that all such per- sons as are assigned any land at Nahant, to further the trade of making fish, That if they do not proceed accordingly to forward the said trade, but either doe grow remiss, or else doe give it quite over, that then all such lotts shall be forfeited again to the towne, to dispose of as shall be thought fitte."
The dissensions which had commenced in Mr. Bachiler's church at an early period, began again to assume a formidable appearance. Some of the members, disliking the conduct of the pastor, and " withal making a question whether they were a church or not," withdrew from the communion. Mr. Bachiler requested them to present their grievances in writing, but as they refused to do that, he gave information that he should proceed to excommuncate them. In consequence of this, a council of ministers was held on the 15th of March. After a deliberation of three days, they decided, that although the church had not been properly instituted, yet the mntual exer- cise of their religious duties had supplied the defect.
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