USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : containing carefully prepared histories of every city and town in the county, Vol. I > Part 5
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or the Massachusetts Bay colonists. The names he gave could not have escaped notice ; indeed, they are frequently used by Winthrop and other early writers on New England. Plymouth, there- fore, was already named when the Pilgrims disem- barked there.1
The name of the river Charles was given to the earliest settlement, which maintained a separate existence until 1873, when it was annexed to Bos- ton. Though swallowed up in the steady expan- sion of the metropolis, with which its interests and its history were too closely identified for a longer separation, we trust the ancient and historical name of Charlestown may survive the political union and remain the distinctive designation of the peninsula for many generations to come.
Winthrop's company were not, however, the first settlers of Charlestown. The territory was a dis- puted one. In 1622 the Council of Plymouth granted to Captain Robert, son of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, a patent covering ten miles in breadth on the coast and extending thirty miles inland on the northeast side of Massachusetts Bay. Upon the death of the patentee his grant was inherited by his brother, John Gorges, who by a deed dated January 10, 1629, conveyed to Sir William Brereton, Bar- onet, of Handforth, in the county of Chester, and
1 Morse's Gazetteer (1797) gives the Indian name of Charles River as Quinobequin ; N. W. Jones' Indian Bulletin gives it as Qun-ne-bo-quin ; meaning it is eireular or erooked.
39
THE SETTLEMENT AT CHARLESTOWN.
his heirs, " all the land in breadth lying from the east side of Charles River to the easterly part of the cape called Nahant, and all the lands lying in length twenty miles northeast into the main-land from the mouth of the said Charles River, lying also in length twenty miles into the main-land northeast from the said cape Nahant." This is the same Brereton mentioned in our account of the Massachusetts Company. It will be perceived that his grant covered the same tract already conveyed under patent to that Company.
Sir William, in a spirit which does him honor, declined to contest the Company's title to the lands jointly claimed, but asked that a " proportionable quantity " might be allotted to him for the people and servants he was about sending over. The Company refused to entertain this or any proposal that might seem to concede the validity of Brere- ton's grant ; although he either was already become, or had declared his intention of becoming, a partner in their undertaking.
Sir William Brereton being thus disposed of, a new claimant appears in the person of John Old- ham, whose expulsion from Plymouth Colony has been related. His claim was in virtue of a grant from Gorges to himself and John Dorrell, for all the lands lying between the Charles and Saugus rivers, extending in a straight line five miles up the first and three miles up the last named stream. William Blaxton, or Blackstone, clerk, and Wil- liam Jeffrys, gentleman, were authorized to put Oldham in possession. It thus appears, beyond a reasonable doubt, that John Gorges was in actual .possession of his patent by his agent, Blackstone. The records of the Massachusetts Company show that Oldham applied to have his patent examined by them, and though they refused to take official action upon the application, the examination was nevertheless made, when the tenor of the grant ap- peared to be as just related. Oldham's grant was declared to be void in law by the Company, but in order to strengthen their own position, and at the same time render Oldham powerless, -for he was personally urging his claim with the dogged perse- verance characteristic of the man,- Governor Cra- dock wrote to Endicott, in April, 1629, to send forty or fifty persons to inhabit the disputed terri- tory as soon as the ships, then preparing to sail, arrived at Naumkeag. He was also advised to treat such old planters as might be living within the boundaries of Oldham's grant in the same manner as the Company's people were treated ; or
even to allow them still greater privileges if he saw cause for so doing.
Among those who arrived at Governor Endi- cott's plantation at Salem were the three broth- ers, Ralph, Richard, and William Sprague, who seem to have been possessed with a desire to explore the shores of the bay lying to the westward. Having obtained the governor's consent, they with three or four companions set out from Salem, and, after a fatiguing journey through the woods, came to the peninsula between the Charles and Mystic rivers. They found it full of natives who are termed Aber- ginians, whose chief, John Sagamore, freely con- sented that the strange Englishmen might settle at Mishawum. They also found here an Englishman named Thomas Walford, a smith, living in a house covered with thatch and surrounded by a palisade. Thomas Walford 1 was, therefore, the first white settler within the original limits of Middlesex County. Upon further survey these explorers found the peninsula, as well as the adjacent main- land, full of stately timber. The Charlestown records,2 from which this account is taken, refer the arrival of the Spragues to the year 1628.
How or when this solitary white man, Thomas Walford, first became a resident of Mishawum is only a matter of conjecture. The simple fact that he and three or four others of his countrymen made their habitations in this wilderness is full of romantic interest. What were the motives which prompted this seclusion ? What the fearless char- acter of the man who ventured thus alone to rear his humble thatch among the wigwams of the red Aberginians ? Was he an outcast seeking an im-
1 Too little is known of this man. The records state his oc- cupation to have been that of a smith. In April, 1631, he was banished for " contempt of authority," ete. When fined for some unknown offenee he paid the penalty by killing a wolf. Like many others he removed to Piscataqua. It is a hard commen- tary upon the policy of the new-comers that the original English settlers disappeared before it.
2 We do not use these records with that confidenee which usually inspires the historian when drawing from such sources. The account of the first English settlement at Charlestown was written in 1664, many years after the events it describes, and is, of course, largely traditional. There is confusion in fixing the time of arrival of the Spragues and of Graves, the engineer, in the same year, 1628. Graves did not come over until the next year. Moreover, there is a difference between a settlement be- gun by six or seven persons ("Ralph, Richard, and William Sprague, with three or four more ") and one begun hy nearly a hundred persons, as was that uoder Graves and Bright. We therefore incline to the opinion that the discovery party of the Spragues did not remain at Mishawum, but returned to Naum- keag to report what they had seen, going back with Graves the next summer.
40
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
pregnable asylum, or was he a wanderer who shunned the companionship of his own race, - the restraints of their laws, their customs, their re- ligion ? His boldness in seeking a home among the savages, his contempt for the authority of the Puritan magistrates when the settlers invaded his solitary state, lead us to infer that he was one of those free spirits who cannot breathe freely in the atmosphere of cities, yet who by the very act of separating themselves from society become the unwilling pioneers of civilization itself. Thomas Walford builded better than he knew.
It is probable that the Spragues, with their com- panions, after exploring not only the peninsula of Mishawum, but the neighborhood, returned to Naumkeag to make report of their discovery ; for upon the arrival of the ships with the second embarkation Governor Endicott, mindful of his instructions, despatched Thomas Graves, the Com- pany's engineer, with a considerable number of the new settlers, directly to the spot visited by them. Rev. Francis Higginson tells us that when he and his companions arrived, the old and new planters numbered about three hundred, of whom two hun- dred settled at Naumkeag, now called Salem, while the rest were beginning to build a town in Mas- sachusetts Bay which they called Cherton, or Charlestown. This was in the summer of 1629.
Thomas Graves, whose experience in mining, surveying, and fortification had brought him to the Company's notice, was under a contract to serve them one year in his capacity of mining, civil, and military engineer, or three, if his services should be required so long. He was also appointed a member of Endicott's council, and seems to have possessed sufficient knowledge and ability to ren- der his co-operation valuable in the new plantation. Mr. Graves immediately laid out the town of Charlestown about the eminence called the Town Hill; the proposing inhabitants were each allotted two acres of land, which Graves surveyed and measured for them.
"Upon which," say the records, " Ralph Sprague and others began to build their houses, and to pre- pare fencing for their lots, which was afterwards set up almost in a semi-circular form on the south and southeast side of that field laid out to them, which lies situate on the northwest side of the Town Hill. Walter Palmer and one or two more shortly after began to build in a straight line upon their two-aere lots on the east side of the Town Hill, and set up a slight fence in common that ran up
to Thomas Walford's fence ; and this was the be- ginning of the East Field."
Engineer Graves also built an edifice sufficiently large to be designated as the " Great House," de- signed for the use of such as were expected to come over the next year. This building, which was afterwards purchased by the inhabitants and used for a meeting-house, was erected by direction of Governor Winthrop and others. Mr. Frothing- ham, the indefatigable historian of Charlestown, says it stood wholly in the square opposite the lane by the Mansion House. It continued to be used as a place of public worship until 1636, when a new church was built between the town and the neck. Graves also laid out a small fort on the summit of Town Hill, which the inhabitants, stim- ulated by a report that the Narragansett Indians were intending to drive all the English into the sea, raised with great expedition.
The records having erred in fixing Graves's operations in 1628, absolute accuracy cannot be claimed for these interesting details which bring the primitive acts of the first inhabitants so vividly before us; yet, as they state that Ralph Sprague and others did not begin to build until the town was laid out, we conclude that the actual settlement goes no farther back than the summer of 1629. The testimony as to the number of houses erected is equally unsatisfactory, equally open to criticism. Captain Roger Clap tells us in his Memoirs that when in May, 1630, he and others landed at Nantasket, there were some few English in a very destitute condition at Charlestown, which he after- wards found to consist of a few wigwams and one house ; he also is writing long after the occurrence he relates. The records assert that upon the arrival of Winthrop's Company the governor and some of the patentees occupied the Great House. If this be true, there were then two houses standing on the peninsula, the other being that of Walford, the smith.
Clap's account has led to the inference that the settlement had been abandoned by all except Wal- ford when he visited it.1 There is no positive evi- denee of other occupation when Winthrop arrived. During the winter of 1629 - 30 disease had again attacked the Salem colonists, and it is not improb- able may have also visited the handful of settlers
1 Captain Roger Clap came over with Captain Squeb, in the Mary and John, landing at Nantasket 30th May, 1630, some weeks before the arrival of Winthrop. Clap's Memoirs were printed in Boston in 1701.
11
THE SETTLEMENT AT CILARLESTOWN.
at Charlestown. Neither Winthrop nor Dudley mentions in his journal the presence of any in- habitants at Charlestown, though Maverick, the solitary settler on Noddle's Island, is mentioned. We think it hardly probable that such a circum- stance would have been forgotten by them, though it must be remembered that neither they nor their companions had then fixed upon a place for settle- ment, and that the subsequent selection of Charles- town for the chief town was not so much a matter of choice as of necessity. But whether the settle- ment begun by Graves and the Spragues was or was not a continuons one, Charlestown had now a definite status and a name among the New Eng- land plantations.
We must now interrupt our narrative to men- tion an attempted settlement in another part of the county. Before the sailing of Winthrop and his company from England another band of emigrants had embarked at Plymouth on board the ship Mary and John, of four hundred tons burden. These people were principally from Devonshire, Somer- setshire, and Dorsetshire. With them were the Rev. Mr. Warham, Rev. Mr. Maverick, and two of the assistants of the Massachusetts Company, Ros- siter and Ludlow. They sailed from Plymouth Sound, March 20, 1630, arriving at Nantasket on the 30th of May following. Squeb, their captain, conceiving his voyage terminated, put all his pas- sengers on shore at Nantasket, refusing to carry them into Charles River, which they claimed he was bound by his agreement to do. Their situation here, without other shelter than a few miserable huts left standing by Conant, and without even a boat to transport themselves to their true desti- nation, became one of grave apprehension to them; and finding the shipmaster inexorable, they imme- diately cast about for a place of permanent settle- ment. This accidental landing upon the southern- most point of Boston Bay led to the settlement of Dorchester, as a disembarkation at Charlestown might and probably would have led to a settlement somewhere upon Charles River.
The first thing these emigrants did was to pro- cure a boat from some of the old planters about the bay, and to despatch in her a party of explora-
tion. These discoverers landed first at Charles- town, where they were received by a man presumed to be Thomas Walford, who, then having nothing else, gave them fish to cat. They pursued their way up the Charles until it grew narrow and shallow, when they landed under a steep bank and with much toil conveyed their goods to the shore. Night coming on, sentinels were set, for they were apprized that a large body of Indians were watch- ing their movements. Having with them an old planter, who, it is presumed, acted as their pilot on this occasion, the Englishmen sent him to advise the savages not to enter their encampment during the night, and were unmolested by them ; but in the morning friendly communication was established by the exchange of a bass for an Eng- lish biscuit, after which the Indians came freely among them. The scene of this adventure is sup- posed to be on the ground now occupied by the United States Arsenal at Watertown.
The exploring party had remained here but a few days, during which they erected a shelter for their goods, when they were recalled to join their brethren at a place called Mattapan by the Indians and Dorchester by these people. Dr. Abiel Holmes relates in his Annals that the place of landing on Charles River was called " Dorchester Fields." Thus ended the first attempt to build a town above Charlestown on the Charles. We shall see that its accomplishment was not long deferred.
Before taking leave of the Dorchester settlers it is proper to remark that they were unquestionably the most compact, best assorted, and most homo- geneous body of men who came over in the great emigration of 1630. Before sailing they had made choice of their ministers, solemnizing the occasion by a fast, and by preaching and prayer, in the New Hospital of Plymouth. Being settled in their religious organization, they transported themselves to New England as a congregation in which the doubts, dissensions, and anxieties that assailed others had apparently no place. In fixing the order of New England congregational churches we do not see how the third place can be more properly assigned than to the Dorchester congre- gation.
42
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
V.
THE GREAT EMIGRATION.
THE fleet whose departure from England has been witnessed had a long and tempestuous voyage across the Atlantic. At two o'clock on the afternoon of the 6th of June land was discovered in forty-three and a quarter degrees north, from the deck of the Arbella. Towards night it grew calm and foggy, the wind blowing from the south and east. Being to the northward of the Isles of Shoals, they steered west by north, meaning to make the land off Mount Agamenticus. On the 7th, it still being calm and the ships making little way, they diverted them- selves by fishing for cod. On the 8th they sighted the peaks of Mount Desert, ten leagues distant. Then they tacked and stood W. S. W., the fair June day and the welcome shore refreshing them with their sunshine and their fragrance. The 9th they sailed merrily along the New England coast. The 10th the grand White Hills, vague and shadowy as spirits of the air, glided into view. With favoring breezes the ships bounded over the swelling billows, and like mettled coursers seemed to put forth their greatest speed as they neared the goal.
On Friday, the 11th, the voyagers were off the Isles of Shoals, where they saw a ship at anchor. The wind being adverse they were all day in sight of Cape Ann. About four in the morning of the 12th the colonists were roused from slumber by the report of a cannon. The ships were nearing their port. The eventful day was just breaking. On the right loomed in the obscure light of early dawn the high promontory of the cape, crowned with the forest and enthroned amid the everlasting surges. Here, in its spacions haven, was the scene of the beginning of Conant's plantation, and there, by the shore, were the humble cottages of the men who, emulating the high example of the Pilgrims, said, "We will not go back." Here the tawny cliffs of Norman's Woe were bathed in glistening foam. The cool morning air came laden with the pungent odor of pine and cedar, the aromatic per- fume of magnolia, bayberry, and sweet fern. As the Arbella forged slowly on towards the harbor a
ship was seen lying there at anchor. The master of the Arbella immediately launched his skiff, which pulled off to board the stranger. In about an hour the Arbella was herself boarded by Isaac Allerton. Seeing now another shallop coming towards them, the Arbella stood on to meet her. Passing through the strait between Baker's Isle and Little Misery, the vessel dropped her anchor between Marblehead and the highlands of Beverly. The voyage was ended.
The ship lying in the harbor of Cape Ann was the Lion, Captain William Peirce, from Bristol, England, whence she had brought a number of colonists to join their brethren at Plymouth, from whom they had been nearly ten years separated. Captain Peirce immediately repaired on board the Arbella, and, after greeting the newly arrived head of the colony, went on shore to fetch Governor Endicott. The latter came off to the ship in the afternoon, and then, with true hospitality, invited the principal personages with their wives on shore, where they supped on "good venison pasty and good beer," and were afterwards conveyed on board their vessel. The common people went on the Cape Ann shore, and regaled themselves as plen- teously, if not as sumptuously, as-their betters, on the wild strawberries they found growing there. Surely, no stronger contrast could be drawn than this bounteous welcome of Man and Nature with the sad, ill-omened landing from the Mayflower at Plymouth on that bleak December day.
One other incident, in which history repeats itself, deserves to be recorded. As Samoset wel- comed the Pilgrims, so now Masconomo, sagamore of Agawam, came on board the Arbella to welcome the Englishmen. It is not the first instance of true nobility concealed beneath a dusky skin. What- ever doubts may have lurked in his breast, the chiv- alric spirit of the savage chieftain prompted a deed of high courtesy to those who were to become liis neighbors, and-did he vaguely forecast it ?- erelong his successors in the land of his fathers.
Before proceeding further with our narrative, it
43
THE GREAT EMIGRATION.
is proper to mention a source of information from which we have liberally drawn, and which cannot fail to deeply interest even the casual reader.1
The first and by far the most picturesque ac- count of the settlements in Middlesex is that of Thomas Dudley, one of the five original under- takers; also one of the assistants of the new colony ; deputy, and subsequently governor. Re- membering his noble benefactress, the Countess of Lincoln, who, he says, had honored him with many favors in Old England, he sits down by his own humble fireside, and with the paper on his knee, - for he had no table, - interrupted by the frequent coming and going of the members of his family, stopping from time to time to restore warmth to his benumbed fingers, while the chill March winds scatter the ashes on the hearthstone, the sturdy old soldier writes the letter which so graphically portrays the trials with which the colonists found themselves unexpectedly confronted. He is frank, too, and plain-spoken in exposing the bombast of those well-meaning but inflated writers whose ex- aggerated accounts had been received in England as true and reliable. And he says he does this " lest other men should fall short of their expec- tations when they come hither, as we to our great prejudice did by means of letters sent us from hence into England, wherein honest men ont of a desire to draw over others to them wrote somewhat hyperbolically of many things here."
From the 12th until the 17th the new-comers remained at Salem. Cordial as their welcome un- questionably was they were unprepared for what awaited them. More than eighty of Endicott's people had died during the winter; many were still sick, and others weak and dispirited. Not more than a fortnight's supply of bread and corn remained in the plantation ; and it was now found that the provisions intended for the Com- pany's servants here had, through negligence, not been put on board. So they were forced to give all these persons whose labor was hired their liberty. How painfully must the reflection have come home to Winthrop, Dudley, Johnson, and others like them, that they had been deceived by the "too large commendations " of their friends !
" But," says the patient Dudley, " bearing these things as we might, we began to consider the place of our sitting down, for Salem, where we landed,
1 We also refer to Governor Winthrop's Journal, the Charles- town records, Wonder-Working Providence, Hubbard, and Prince.
pleased us not." With this object in view, on Thursday, the 17th, Governor Winthrop with others went to Massachusetts, which then meant the terri- tory comprised between the headlands of Nahant and Nantasket. The party is said to have gone six miles up the Mystic River ; but as that stream is not navigable so far, it is impossible to fix the limit of their exploration with precision. They reported, however, on their return, having found a suitable situation on this stream. A second party, which followed the first to confirm or condemn its judgment, found a location more to their liking up Charles River. Upon this, the new colonists with much cost and labor put their goods into other vessels and brought them to Charlestown. But now an insuperable obstacle prevented the exe- cntion of their plan. Many of the newly arrived emigrants were siek of fever and of the scurvy ; so many that the rest were obliged to renounce their intention of settling higher up the river, be- canse the well were unable to transport the baggage, stores, and ordnance so far. Nevertheless, time was pressing. Under such conditions the settle- ment at Charlestown began.
By the 6th of July thirteen of the seventeen ves- sels despatched by the Company had arrived at Charlestown and Salem, some bringing their pas- sengers in good health, others landing theirs half starved. The Talbot lost fourteen persons on her outward voyage, and in one or another of the ships there were serious losses of horses, goats, and other live stock. At this time the roadstead, the strand, and the hills of Charlestown must have presented a busy scene. The ships were hoisting out their cargoes ; deeply laden boats continually passed to and from the shore, where active laborers unloaded them. The river dotted with horses, kine, sheep, and goats swimming to the land, the air filled with neigh- ing, lowing, and bleating, the songs of the sailors, the rattling of tackle, the hallooing, shouting, and laughter from ship to shore, were at once a curious spectacle and a rude transition from the silence of ages. About the Town Hill the multitude were busy building cottages, making booths, or setting up tents and even wigwams for a shelter from the sultry summer sun or copious rains that alter- nately scorched or drenched them. At such a time all must labor. Tender women must ent rushes and evergreen boughs for the new roof; while the solemn old woods echoed again to the axes of the men. Others were eagerly seeking out and gather- ing their household goods about them. Little
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