USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Saugus > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 2
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Nahant > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 2
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynnfield > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 2
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Swampscott > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 2
USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Lynn > History of Lynn, Essex county, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant > Part 2
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
The advancement of the American colonies has been unpar- alleled in the annals of the world. Two hundred years have scarcely circled their luminous flight over this now cultivated region, since the most populous towns of New England were a wilderness. No sound was heard in the morning but the voice
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of the Indian, and the notes of the wild birds, as they woke their early hymn to their Creator; and at evening, no praise went up to heaven, but the desolate howl of the wolf, and the sweet but mournful song of the whip-poor-will. The wild powah of the savage sometimes broke into the silence of nature, like the wailing for the dead; but the prayer of the Christian was never heard to ascend from the melancholy waste. The moun- tains that lifted their sunny tops above the clouds, and the rivers, which for thousands of miles rolled their murmuring waters through the deserts, were unbeheld by an eye which could perceive the true majesty of God, or a heart that could frame language to his praise. At length the emigrants from England arrived, and the western shore of the Atlantic began to hear the more cheerful voices of civilization and refinement. Pleasant villages were seen in the midst of the wide wilderness ; and houses for the worship of God, and schools for the instruc- tion of children arose, where the wild beast had his lair. The men of those days were compelled to endure privations, and to overcome difficulties, which exist to us only on the page of his- tory. In passing through the forest, if they turned from the bear, it was to meet the wolf; and if they fled from the wolf, it was to encounter the deadly spring of the insidious catamount. At some periods, the planter could not travel from one settle- ment to another, without the dread of being shot by the silent arrow of the unseen Indian; nor could his children pursue their sports in the shady woods, or gather berries in the green pas- tures, without danger of treading on the coiled rattlesnake or being carried away by the remorseless enemy. The little ham- lets, and the lonely dwellings, which rose, at long intervals, over the plains and among the forests, were frequently alarmed by the howl of the wolf and the yell of the savage; and often were their thresholds drenched in the blood of the beautiful and the innocent. The dangers of those days have passed away, with the men who sustained them, and we enjoy the fruit of their industry and peril. They have toiled, and fought, and bled for our repose. Scarcely a spot of New England can be found, which has not been fertilized by the sweat or the blood of our ancestors. How greatful should we be to that good Being who has bestowed on us the reward of their enterprise !
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GENERAL REMARKS.
Historians and poets have written much in commendation of the fathers of New England; but what shall be said in praise of those brave, noble, and virtuous women, the mothers of New England, who left their homes, and friends, and every thing that was naturally dear to them, in a country where every lux- ury was at command, to brave the perils of a voyage of three thousand miles over a stormy ocean, and the privations of an approaching winter, in a country inhabited by savages and wild beasts ? If we are under obligation to our fathers, for their exertions, we are also indebted to our mothers for their virtues.
The day on which the May Flower landed her passengers on the Rock of Plymouth, was a fatal one for the aborigines of America. From that day, the towns of New England began to spring up among their wigwams, and along their hunting- grounds ; and though sickness, and want, and the tomahawk, made frequent and fearful incursions on the little bands of the planters, yet their numbers continued to increase, till they have become a great and powerful community. It is indeed a pleas- ing and interesting employment, to trace the progress of the primitive colonies - for each town was in itself a little colony, a miniature republic, and the history of one is almost the his- tory of all-to behold them contending with the storms and inclemencies of an unfriendly climate, and with the repeated depredations of a hostile and uncivilized people, till we find them emerging into a state of political prosperity, unsurpassed by any nation upon earth. But it is painful to reflect, that in the accomplishment of this great purpose, the nations of the wilderness, who constituted a separate race, have been nearly destroyed. At more than one period, the white people seem to have been in danger of extermination by the warlike and exas- perated Indians ; but in a few years, the independent Sassacus, and the noble Miantonimo, and the princely Pometacom, saw their once populous and powerful nations gradually wasting away and disappearing. In vain did they sharpen their toma- hawks, and point their arrows anew for the breasts of the white men. In vain did the valiant Wampanoag despatch his trusty warriors two hundred miles across the forest, to invite the Ta- ratines to lend their aid in exterminating the English. The days of their prosperity had passed away. The time had come B+ 2
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when a great people were to be driven from the place of their nativity - when the long line of sachems, who had ruled over the wilderness for unknown ages, was to be broken, and their fires extinguished. Darkness, like that which precedes the light of morning, fell over them; and the sunrise of refinement has dawned upon another people. The pestilence had destroyed thousands of the bravest of their warriors, and left the remain- der feeble and disheartened. Feuds and dissensions prevailed among the tribes ; and though they made frequent depredations upon the defenseless settlements, and burnt many dwellings, and destroyed many lives, yet the immigrants soon became the ascendants in number and in power; and the feeble remnant of the red men, wearied and exhausted by unsuccessful conflicts, relinquished the long possession of their native soil, and retired into the pathless forests of the west.
Much has been written to free the white people from the charge of aggression, and much to extenuate the implacability of the Indians. We should be cautious in censuring the con- duct of men through whose energies we have received many of our dearest privileges. And they who condemn the first settlers of New England as destitute of all true principle, err as much as they who laud their conduct with indiscriminate applause. Passionate opinion and violent action were the gen- eral faults of their time. And when they saw that one principle was overstrained in its effect, they scarcely thought themselves safe until they had vacillated to the opposite extreme. Regard- ing themselves, like the Israelites, as a peculiar people, they imagined that they had a right to destroy the red men as hea- then. The arms which at first they took up with the idea that they were requisite for self-defense, were soon employed in a war of extermination. And the generous mind is grieved to think, that instead of endeavoring to conciliate the Indians by kindness, they should have deemed it expedient to determine their destruction.
The Indians had undoubtedly good cause to be jealous of the arrival of another people, and in some instances to consider themselves injured by their encroachments. Their tribes had inhabited the wilderness for ages, and the country was their home. Here were the scenes of their youthful sports, and here
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GENERAL REMARKS.
were the graves of their fathers. Here they had lived and loved, here they had warred and sung, and grown old with the hills and rocks. Here they had pursued the deer-not those " formed of clouds," like the poetical creations of Ossian - but the red, beautiful, fleet-footed creatures of the wilderness. Over the glad waters that encircle Nahant, they had bounded in their birch canoes; and in the streams and along the sandy shore, they had spread their nets to gather the treasures of the deep. Their daughters did not adjust their locks before pierglasses, nor copy beautiful stanzas into gilt albums ; but they saw their graceful forms reflected in the clear waters, and their poetry was written in living characters on the green hills, and the sil- ver beach, and the black rocks of Nahant. Their brave sachems wore not the glittering epaulets of modern warfare, nor did the eagle banner of white men wave in their ranks; but the untamed eagle of the woods soared over their heads, and be- neath their feet was the soil of freemen, which had never been sullied by the foot of a slave.
The red men were indeed cruel and implacable in their re- venge ; and if history be true, so have white men been in all ages. I know of no cruelty practised by Indians, which white men have not even exceeded in their refinements of torture. The delineation of Indian barbarities presents awful pictures of blood ; but it should be remembered that those cruelties were committed at a time when the murder of six or eight hundred of the red people, sleeping around their own fires, in the silent repose of night, was deemed a meritorious service. In resist- ing to the last, they fought for their country, for freedom, for life-they contended for the safety and happiness of their wives and children ; for all that brave and high-minded men can hold dear. But they were subdued; and the few who were not either killed or made prisoners, sought refuge in the darker recesses of their native woods. The ocean, in which they had so often bathed, and the streams which had yielded their boun- tiful supplies of fish, were abandoned in silent grief; and the free and fearless Indian, who once wandered in all the pride of unsubdued nature, over our fields and among our forests, was driven from his home, and compelled to look with regret to the shores of the sea, and the pleasant abodes of his youth.
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A few, indeed, continued for some years to linger around the shores of their ancient habitations; but they were like the spirits whom the Bard of Morven has described, " sighing in the wind around the dwellings of their former greatness." They are gone. And over the greater part of New England the voice of the Indian is heard no more. We listen in silent regret to the last faint echo of their reluctant steps in their sorrowful journey over the prairies of the west. We see their long and faint shadows cast by the setting sun, as they thread the defiles of the Rocky Mountains in their despairing march toward the far-off Pacific. A few years, and they may have plunged into that ocean from which there is no return, and the dweller of a future age may wonder what manner of men they were of. That they were originally a noble race, is shown by the grandeur of their language, and by their mellifluous and highly poetical names of places-the yet proud appellations of many of our mountains, lakes, and rivers. It would have been gratifying to the lover of nature, if all the Indian names of places had been preserved, for they all had a meaning, applicable to scenery or event. "Change not barbarous names," said the Persian sage, "for they are given of God, and have inexpressi- ble efficacy." The names of Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant remain ; and may they continue to remain, the imperishable memorials of a race which has long since passed away.
[The thought here expressed, in relation to the language of the Indians, is one that seems to have delighted other writers as well as Mr. Lewis. But is it not rather fanciful than deep, considering that words themselves are arbitrary and valueless excepting in their external relations ? Any people with know- ledge as limited as that of the Indians would necessarily use a simple language and one that would be most directly illustrated by familiar objects and events. The language of the red men abounded in illustrations from nature, and hence to the lover of nature possessed many charms, suggesting, it may be, to the mind of the cultivated hearer poetical ideas, when none existed in the mind of him who used it. Our more extended knowledge supplies a language of greater scope, one that con- tains all the simplicity and poetry of theirs with the additions that flow from science, art, history, and numerous other sources not
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GENERAL REMARKS.
open to them, and hence may not be suggestive of poetical ideas alone, but ideas in all other shapes recognized by the cultivated mind. How much has been heard of the picturesque manner in which the Indians were accustomed to indicate mul- titudes, by comparing them to the stars of heaven, the sands on the shore, the leaves on the trees, and so forth. But in these comparisons there was to them no poetical idea involved. Be- ing ignorant of arithmetic, actually unable to count, they were compelled to resort to some such mode of expression, where the white man would have expressed himself in exact terms. Again, for example, the Indians called a certain island in Boston harbor, The Twins, but the white people called it Spectacle Island. In one case the name was drawn from a semblance in nature; in the other, from a semblance in art. Both are apt enough, and about equally poetical. Yet the Indian name has been lauded as expressive and picturesque far above the other.]
In contemplating the destruction of a great people, the reflect- ing mind is naturally disposed to inquire into the causes of their decay, in order to educe motives for a better conduct, that their wrongs may be in some degree repaired, and a similar fate avoided. If dissension weakened the power of the tribes of the forest, why should it not impair the energies of our free states ? If the red men have fallen through the neglect of moral and religious improvement, to make way for a more refined state of society, and the emanations of a purer worship, how great is the reason to fear that we also may be suffered to wander in our own ways, because we will not know the ways of God, and to fall into doubt, disunion, and strife, till our country shall be given to others, as it has been given to us. He who took the sceptre from the most illustrious and powerful of ancient na- tions, and caused the tide of their prosperity and refinement to flow back and stagnate in the pools of ignorance, obscurity, and servitude, possesses ample means to humble the pride of any nation, when it shall cease to be guided by his counsels. Al- ready have evils of the most alarming consequences passed far ยท on their march of desolation. Already has the spirit of Discord, with his dark shadow, dimmed the brightness of our great coun- cil fire ! Already has the fondness for strong drink seized on thousands of our people, bringing the young to untimely graves,
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sapping the foundations of health and moral excellence, and pulling down the glory of our country. Already has a disregard for the Sabbath and for divine institutions, begun openly to manifest itself; the concomitant of infidelity, and the harbinger of spiritual ruin. If we may trust the appearances in our west- ern regions, our land was once inhabited by civilized men, who must have disappeared long before the arrival of our fathers. May Heaven avert their destiny from us, to evince to the world how virtuous a people may be, on whom the blessing of civil liberty has fallen as an inheritance.
The political system of our nation is probably the best which was ever devised by man for the common good; but it practi- cally embraces one evil too obvious to be disregarded. While it advances the principle that all men have by nature the same civil rights, it retains, with strange inconsistency, one sixth of the whole population in a state of abject bodily and mental servitude. On its own principles, our government has no right to enslave any portion of its subjects ; and I am constrained, in the name of God and truth to say, that they must be free. Christianity and political expediency both demand their eman- cipation, nor will they always remain unheard. Many generous minds are already convinced of the importance of attention to this subject ; and many more might speak in its behalf, in places where they could not be disregarded. Where are the ministers of our holy religion, that their prayers are not preferred for the liberation and enlightenment of men with souls as immortal as their own ? Where are the senators and representatives of our free states, that their voices are not heard in behalf of that most injured race ? Let all who have talents, and power, and influence, exert them to free the slaves from their wrongs, and raise them to the rank and privileges of men. That the colored people possess mental powers capable of extensive cultivation, has been sufficiently evinced in the instances of Gustavus Vasa, Ignatius Sancho, Lislet, Capitein, Fuller, Phillis Wheatley, and many others. [And the reader will not fail to recognize many note-worthy examples presented through the agency of the American rebellion ; examples in which individuals of that op- pressed race have exhibited rare judgment, skill, and valor in the field ; a clear perception of the principles and responsibilities
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GENERAL REMARKS.
of liberty; true generosity of character; ardent longing for culture and advancement.] And the period may arrive when the lights of freedom and science shall shine much more exten- sively on these dark children of bondage - when the knowledge of the true faith shall awaken the nobler principles of their minds, and its practice place them in moral excellence far above those who are now trampling them in the dust. How will the spirit of regret then sadden over the brightness of our country's fame, when the muse of History shall lead their pens to trace the annals of their ancestors, and the inspiration of Poetry instruct their youthful bards to sing the oppression of their fathers in the land of Freedom !
I trust the time will come, when on the annals of our country shall be inscribed the abolition of slavery - when the inhuman custom of war shall be viewed with abhorrence - when human- ity shall no longer be outraged by the exhibition of capital punishments - when the one great principle of LOVE shall per- vade all classes - when the poor shall be furnished with em- ployment and ample remuneration - when men shall unite their exertions for the promotion of those plans which embrace the welfare of the whole -- that the unqualified, approbation of Heaven may be secured to our country, and "that glory may dwell in our land."
[But the unqualified approbation of Heaven can rest only where things are done according to the will of Heaven. And when will the inhabitants of earth attain to perfect obedience ? Had Mr. Lewis lived but a few months longer, he would have been startled from his hopeful dreams by the thunders of a war more to be deplored, in some respects, than any which ever before shook the world - the war of the great American Rebel- lion. He would have beheld enlightened myriads, hosts of professing Christians, going forth heroically to battle for the perpetuation of SLAVERY, and offering up to the God of peace thanksgivings for their bloody achievements. And would he have seen their evil machinations met in that spirit of universal LOVE, so delightful to him to contemplate ? Alas, no. He would have seen here in Lynn, on the open Common, and on the Lord's day, vicegerents of the Prince of peace, whose church doors had been closed that they might appear before the
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multitude to lift up their voices for WAR - war, as a necessity, to shield against evils still more terrible. Blessed were his eyes in that they were closed by death without beholding those scenes which would at once have swept away all his bright anti. cipations, and left him despairing that the time would ever arrive when the heart of man would become so sanctified that the temporal and selfish would not assert their overwhelming power - those scenes which would with force irresistible have taught that earth was not the place to search for heaven's beatitude.]
| In delineating the annals of a single town, it can scarcely be expected that so good an opportunity will be afforded for vari- ety of description and diffusiveness of remark, as in a work of a more general nature. It is also proper to observe that this compilation was begun without any view to publication; but simply to gratify that natural curiosity which must arise in the mind of every one who extends his thoughts beyond the per- sons and incidents which immediately surround him. I may, however, be permitted to hope, that an attempt to delineate with accuracy the principal events which have transpired within my native town, for the space of two hundred years, will be interesting to many, though presented without any endeavor to adorn them with the graces of artificial ornament. My endeavor has been to ascertain facts, and to state them correctly. I have preferred the form of annals for a local history ; for thus every thing is found in its time and place. The labor and expense of making so small a book has been immense, and can never be appreciated by the reader, until he shall undertake to write a faithful history of one of our early towns, after its records have been lost. I could have written many volumes of romance or of general history, while preparing this volume; and I have endeavored to make it so complete, as to leave little for those who come after me, except to continue the work.
[Since Mr. Lewis closed his labors, however, antiquarian research has opened many sources of information. It would be singular indeed if an enterprising and important community like that of Lynn, should, during her history of more than two hun- dred years, furnish nothing worthy of note beyond what might be recorded in an octavo volume of three hundred pages. . The
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present edition will show something of the multitude of inter- esting matters that escaped his careful eye. And it is not to be doubted that many valuable documents of the olden time yet remain in ancient garrets, permeated by herby odors, and per- haps at present used by motherly mice as bedding for their young, which may somewhere in the future come to light to the great joy of the student of the past.]
It should be remembered that previous to the change of the style, in 1752, the year began in March; consequently February was the twelfth month. Ten days also are to be added to the date in the sixteenth century, and eleven in the seventeenth, to bring the dates to the present style. Thus, " 12 mo. 25, 1629," instead of being Christmas-day, as some might suppose, would be March 8th, 1630. In the following pages, I have corrected the years and months, but have left the days undisturbed.
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EARLY VOYAGES AND DISCOVERIES.
IT would be extremely gratifying, if we could roll back the veil of oblivion which shrouds the early history of the American continent, and through the sunlight which must once have illumined those regions of now impenetrable darkness, behold the scenery, and trace the events, which occupied that long space of silence or activity. Has one half of this great globe slumbered in unprofitable and inglorious repose since the morn- ing of the creation, serving no other purpose than to balance the opposite portion in its revolutions through unvarying ages ? Or has it been peopled by innumerable nations, enjoying all the vicissitudes of animal and intellectual life ? [We have the high authority of Agassiz for claiming that the American continent is the oldest of the great divisions of the globe, and that it existed, under its present formation, while Europe was but an extensive group of scattered islands. Ever since the coal period America has been above water.]
The most strenuous advocates of the priority of the claim of Columbus to the discovery of America, admit that he found people here - and we can look back with certainty to no period, however remote, in which we do not find the continent inhab- ited. How came those people here ? Were they the descend- ants of a cis-Atlantic Adam? Or did they find their way, by C
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accident or design, from the eastern continent ? If the latter supposition be the more probable, then a corresponding accident or design might have returned some of those daring adventur- ers to their homes, and thus a knowledge have been conveyed of the existence of another continent. Nor are the difficulties of a passage, either from Europe or Asia, so great as may at first be supposed. The continent of Asia approaches within fifty miles of the northwest coast of America; [or, as some nav- igators say, within thirty-five miles, either continent being at times plainly in sight from the other ;] and ships which traded from Iceland to the Levant, might easily have sailed from Greenland along the shore of New England. People were much more venturous in early days than we are generally wil- ling to allow. And canoes might have passed across the ocean from Japan, and even by the isles of the Pacific-as it is evi- dent they must have done, to people those islands. When Captain Blighe was cast adrift by Christian, he passed twelve hundred miles in an open boat with safety. Why might not such an event have happened three thousand years ago as well as yesterday ?
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