USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : containing carefully prepared histories of every city and town in the county, Vol. I > Part 60
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Such are the developing lines by which Cam- bridge has arrived at its present estate. The germs of the modern city are all to be found in the ancient town. Our fathers " builded better than they knew." They labored, and we have entered into their labors. Whatever has been lack- ing in those natural advantages of place and scenery and surrounding, which go so far toward consti- tuting urban attractions, has been more than made
up by the solid spiritual growths which were here planted in those early days, and in whose blessings we and our descendants have, and are to have, a peculiar share. We forget that Cambridge is the second wealthiest city in the commonwealth, when we stand in the midst of her academic groves, and breathe her scholarly and cultivated atmosphere. More than in her inviting avenues and imposing buildings and memorable precincts does the mind take satisfaction in the intelligence and virtue of her people, and in the long religious and intel- lectual history which her accumulated years have wrought. The city where Longfellow has spent the active years of his life, which he has hallowed by his benign presence, and on whose attentive ear his sweet songs first have fallen ; where Lowell was born, and in which he has won liis scholar's place and author's fame ; where Richard H. Dana was born, and in whose old " burial place " his venerable form now rests; the birthplace, too, of Holmes and Margaret Fuller; and the town where Allston painted and Emerson once taught school, - this is the Cambridge which, none the less than the Cambridge of the Revolution, and of Ilarvard College, and of Stephen Daye, and of Shepard and Hooker and Dudley, will be known and honored in the coming years.
CARLISLE.
359
CARLISLE.
BY B. F. HEALD.
C ARLISLE lies in the central part of Middlesex County, eighteen miles northwest of Bos- ton, and has for its boundaries Acton and Westford on the west, Chelmsford on the north, Billerica and Bedford on the east, - from the latter of which it is separated by Concord River, - and Concord on the south. It was incorporated as a district of Acton in 1780, and invested with the full powers of a town in 1805. Its territory was taken from Con- cord, Acton, Chelmsford, and Billerica, but chiefly from Concord; and its history is closely inter- woven with and runs back to the origin of a short- lived district of -the same name incorporated at an earlier date. This district, with some others that had a little earlier been given an independent exist- ence within the original limits of the mother town, had their origin in the desire of their people to enjoy better facilities for attending public religious worship than they could have in their former con- nection.
At the commencement of the last century Con- cord, including the Winthrop and Dudley grants, and the several grants afterward known as Blood's Farms, with others on its western borders, extended over a territory of more than ten miles square. Consequently, its inhabitants, living near the bor- ders, were at such a distance from the single plaee of public worship, which was near the centre, as in the existing condition of the roads, and with their modes of travelling, would render it always inconvenient and often impossible to attend. Hence the persistent efforts that had been made, and were continually being made to form new towns from detached parts of the old one.
In 1752 a number of the inhabitants of the north part of the town petitioned that all that part of Concord lying north of the Concord and Assabet rivers might be set off into a separate township. But the old mother town, having within a period
of twenty years yielded a large portion of her patrimony to endow her elder daughters, Bedford, Acton, Lincoln, and Littleton, was in no mood to submit to further spoliation, and summarily re- jected the petition.
The petitioners, two years after, presented an- other petition to the same effect, directly to the General Court; and, notwithstanding strong oppo- sition by the town, were partially successful. An act was passed April 19, 1754, setting off that part of the territory asked for, lying north of a certain line, into the district of Carlisle. The line was described in the act as commencing at the mouth of Ralph's Brook, a small stream running into Concord River, thence running northwestward by several angles to the Acton line, near the house of Benjamin Temple. The other boundaries were Acton and Westford on the west, Chelmsford and Billerica on the north, and Concord River on the south. These bounds included nearly one third of the limits of the old town. The name was de- rived from Carlisle in Cumberland County, Eng- land, the birthplace and early home of James Adams, known in the early records as " Goodman Adams," who was banished for political offences from England by Oliver Cromwell, about 1640, and was said to have been the first white man who settled within the limits of the district.
The organization of the district took place at a meeting held at the house of Joseph Adams (sup- posed to be the same now owned and occupied by the heirs of the late John Melven), May 3, 1754, when John Hartwell was chosen district clerk, and also with John Green, Joseph Adams, Jonathan Puffer, and William Fletcher, selectmen ; Deacon Ephraim Brown was chosen treasurer. The people next addressed themselves to the most important question of all, - the selection of a site for a meeting-house. The subject was brought before a special meeting held June 2, when discussion disclosed those irreconcilable views that ever kept the district in a turmoil during its brief existence, and caused its final dissolution. This unfortunate
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HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
result may not have been -as Shattuck in his history would seem to imply - wholly attributable to a spirit of disunion and discord inherent in the people, but partly, at least, to the peculiar geo- graphical features of the district. An area of more than two miles square in the very central part was much of it low and swampy, not suscepti- ble of high cultivation, with no public roads, and very few inhabitants. Most of the settlements were on the east and west sides of the district, and these localities gave nearly equal numbers to the principal parties in the controversies. As, there- fore, the central portion afforded no desirable vil- lage location, one must be selected that would be to the advantage of one side at the expense of the other. Hence the intensity of the conflict, and the hopelessness of settling it to the general satisfac- tion.
At a meeting held July 17 it was voted to build the meeting-house on Lieutenant Jonathan But- trick's plain. This was a victory for the east side, bat it was wrested from them by a vote, passed October 9, to have a survey of the district, and a committee of gentlemen from abroad were appointed to select a site. But the survey was not satisfac- tory nor the report of the committee accepted, and thus ended the first year's efforts of the district to " perfix " a place for their house of worship. The next commenced January 22, 1756, by a vote again to build on Captain Buttrick's land. This was ar- rested by a vote of reconsideration passed March 3, when a committee was chosen to petition the General Court for an increase of territory on the south line as far as Concord and Assabet rivers. April 30 it was voted to dismiss the committee, and to build a meeting-house on Poplar IIill. This was to the advantage of the west side. June 3 it was voted not to build on Poplar Hill, and four other places proposed to the meeting were re- jected. July 9 a committee was chosen to petition the General Court to select a spot. Probably no petition was ever presented. This closed the efforts made in 1755, and the result was to leave the ques- tion precisely where it was in the beginning. The campaign of 1756 opened January 27, with a vote to build a meeting-house, but the meeting forbore to approach at that time the vexed question of location.
At a meeting held February 3, and by adjourn- ment March 1, 1756, it was voted for the third time to build on Captain Buttrick's plain, and a committee consisting of Samuel Heald and others
were appointed to purchase land, procure materials, and proceed to erect a meeting-house. Fifty pounds were voted toward defraying the expense, and the committee without delay addressed themselves to their work ; they had made some progress when their authority was revoked by a district meeting held in May, when a committee, consisting of Major John Jones of Sudbury, Colonel William Lawrence of Groton, and Major Ephraim Curtis of Sudbury were selected to make a new survey and " to view all the circumstances of the district " and fix a place. They attended to their duty, and re- ported that the most convenient place to build was on Poplar Hill. The point here designated is about half a mile southwest from the house of the late Isaiah Green, and one and a half miles north- west from the proposed location on Captain But- trick's land. This report was accepted June 16, and a committee chosen to purchase land and build a house. But they had only time to bargain for the ground and to move up the materials that had been collected on Captain Buttrick's land, when the following petition, dated Carlisle, June 24, 1756, was presented to the selectmen : -
" We the subscribers, being sensible of the great difficulties we labor under, and the great hardships we are unavoidably exposed to, if we are obliged, under such circumstances as we are in at present, to build a meeting-house and settle a minister, and pay for highways, that will be necessary to accomo- date the inhabitants if we proceed accordingly to the design of being set off, - the situation of the district being such that but a small part of the inhabitants can be much better accommodated with the public worship in any place it has been proposed than they are in the town of Concord, - desire that you will call a meeting of the district as soon as can or may be, to see if the district will not agree by their vote to petition the General Court that said district may be set back to the town of Concord with our former privileges ; and choose a committee for that purpose."
The petition was signed by Ephraim Stow and ten others. The selectmen refused to act upon it, and the meeting was called, July 14, by a justice of the peace. The petitioners prevailed, and a com- mittee to carry out the views above expressed was appointed. A strong remonstrance, however, was made against this action, and two more district meetings were called to dismiss the committee ; but without avail. An act was passed, January 11, 1757, setting back the district to Concord, and
361
CARLISLE.
providing for closing up its municipal concerns ; a vote having been passed that none of the inhabi- tants should again be set off into a separate town, except such as should sign a petition for that pur- pose.
During its brief and stormy existence money was raised for schools and other municipal purposes, public worship was generally maintained, and a number of roads were laid out and imperfectly constructed, most of whichi, however, have long since fallen into disuse. Notwithstanding the unfortunate ending of their former efforts to obtain what seemed to them the blessings of separate town privileges, but little time was suffered to elapse before a large part of the inhabitants of the old district, with others from the adjoining towns, united to obtain a separation from their parent towns, and to form a new organization ; and this time by a process less likely to lead to difficulty and final disaster. They proposed first to fix a site and build their meeting-house before forming their town or district, instead of reversing this order of proceedings, as in their former efforts. In 1758 Timothy Wilkins of Concord, " moved thereunto," as he tells us in his deed, " by the love and regard he had for the publick worship of God and the good of his nabors and fellow creturs," conveyed to John Green and others, of Concord, Chelmsford, and Billerica, a lot of land, containing one and one half acres, for building a meeting-house for the worship of God and for other public uses. This land lay nearly two miles north of Poplar Hill, and is that upon which the Unitarian Church in Carlisle now stands. From a statement in a petition after- wards presented to the General Court, it appears that a meeting-house was built the same year. It was a rude structure 30 × 40 feet, without finish outside or inside, and furnished only with rough benches for seats and a table for a pulpit. But it answered well enough for the main purpose of the builders, which undoubtedly was to form a nucleus around which to gather their anticipated town. Within two years a petition in the following terms was presented to the General Court :
" To his Excellency Thomas Pownal Esq Cap- tain General & Govr in chief in and over his majesty's Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New England, Honbls his majesty's Council & Hous of Representatives in General Court assembled the 19 day of march anno Domino 1760.
" The Petition of Part of the inhabitants of
Concord, Acton, Chelmsford, and Billerica humbly showeth ;
" That we your petitioners living very remot from Publick Worship of God iu the several towns to which we Respectively Belong, and in the Winter time Cannot posibly attend the Publick Worship of God with oure families have for these several Winters hired preaching beside paying our propor- tionable expence where we Belong and have the Fall Before last Erected a Meeting Hous for the Public Worship of God and have had preaching in Said meeting hous for the most part of the time ever since where we and oure familes can much more comfortably attend, and the charges of build- ing meeting Hous and hiring Preaching besides paying to our Respective Towns are verry great and heavy on us.
" Therefore we Humbly pray that your Excel- lency & Honours would be pleased to set us off into a District or a town according to the following bounds as your great wisdom shall think proper, and we as in Duty Bound shall ever pray &c."
We omit the description of the boundaries, which included much more territory than was finally set off to the town; and also the names of the fifty inhabitants attached to the petition. But the peti- tioners failed to gain their object at that time, and it was not for twenty years, or on the 28th of April, 1780, that an act of incorporation was finally ob- tained. The act contained the anomalous provision that certain parties living within the limits pre- scribed by the act, with their farms, should still continue to belong to Concord, unless within one year from its passage they should signify in writing to the secretary of the commonwealth their choice to belong to Carlisle. These parties had not peti- tioned for the act, and were exempted from its operation, agreeably to a vote passed at the dissolu- tion of old Carlisle. They never complied with the conditions, and still retain their connection with Concord. And this is the cause of that zigzag line between the two towns that has so often tried the pa- tience and skill of surveyors and perambulators.
The first meeting of the new district was called May 8, 1780, in the meeting-house already spoken of, which seems to have been transferred by its original proprietors to the district, as £1000 was voted at the time to improve and finish it. Phine- has Blood presided, and Zebulon Spaulding was chosen clerk ; Captain Samuel Heald, treasurer ; Zebulon Spaulding, Phinehas Blood, and Lieuten- ant John Heald, selectmen ; for a committee of
362
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
safety, John Green, Thomas Spaulding, Captain Israel Heald, Thomas Hodginan, and Nathan Munroe ; for tithing-men, Nathan Munroe and Lientenant Issachar Andrews ; for deer-reeve, Jonas Robbins.
The first year of its corporate existence the district cheerfully assumed its share of the burdens of furnishing men and means to support the coun- try in its Revolutionary struggle, and continued to ilo so to its close. Captain Samuel Heald, Lieu- tenant John Heald, and Lieutenant Asa Green were the only men known to have borne commissions in the service. Twenty-six men were raised in about two years for the Continental army, and consider- able quantities of beef and clothing were furnished, the whole costing not less than $8,000. And when to this onerous war tax is added over $ 8,000 raised during the first three years of its existence for the payment of state taxes and other district charges, we may estimate to some extent the sacri- fices the Revolutionary fathers were called upon to make in the cause of civil and religious liberty. But, notwithstanding the hardships under which they labored, not only from heavy taxation, but also from the scarcity of money and the deprecia- tion of that in use, the inhabitants of Carlisle never complained or faltered in their allegiance to the government.
The few years subsequent to the close of the war were years of great hardship to the people of the country ; and the citizens of Carlisle in com- mon with others, and perhaps more than most others, from their recent incorporation, and the necessity of establishing highways, erecting school- houses, and finishing a meeting-house, felt the pressure of the times. They united by delegates, with other towns in the county, in a convention held at Concord, August 23, 1786, and by adjourn- ment to October 3 of the same year, " to consult on matters of public grievance under which the people labor," and they acknowledged the reality of many in the list of seventeen grievances drawn up by the convention; yet they contended they were of such a nature as would soon yield to patience, economy, and industry, but were not to be re- dressed by lawless violence. They denied the re- sponsibility of the government for their existence, or that it should be compelled to execute the man- dates of a mob by the adoption of rash and uncon- stitutional measures for their removal. And when from threats the controversy had passed to acts, and the standard of insurrection had been raised,
Carlisle voted unanimously to stand by the govern- ment, and to render it all the assistance that might be required of her to put down rebellion. Their united loyalty to the government, when so many became discouraged and faltered, was long the pride and boast of the people, and some now liv- ing will remember the story often told by the men of that day, that Carlisle had but one Shays man, and that, as a matter of safety, he thought " it best to absent himself for some time from his home."
Another source of annoyance at the time was the numerous idle and dissipated persons, and many who were disorderly and vicious, that were con- stantly making their way into, and taking up their domiciles in, the district. They were generally persons who had become demoralized by long ser- vice in the army, and who were liable to become subjects of public charge. To guard against this liability, the district voted in 1784 to instruct the selectmen to warn all persons who should come to reside within its limits to depart forthwith and not to be found again therein. An attempt was made, two or three years after, to modify or rescind this vote, but it proved unsuccessful, and it probably continued a by-law of the district as long as the " warning-out " law continned in force. Another vote showing the jealous care with which the dis- trict guarded its material interests was one consti- tuting the selectmen and two other citizens a committee " to take measures to prevent Hannah Melven from becoming a pauper." Precisely what measures this formidable committee were to adopt to effect their purpose is not recorded ; but it may be inferred that they were of an effective character, as the committee were instructed to confer and ad- vise with the selectmen of Billerica in the matter. We are not told whether the combined wisdom of the two boards prevented Hannah Melven from be- coming a pauper.
From the time of the suppression of Shays' Re- bellion, the establishment of the government upon a firm basis, and the introduction of a sound cur- rency, the people began to improve in their mna- terial interests. Industry revived, farms and farm buildings were improved, and an era of per- manent prosperity commenced. New highways were laid out and built, and old ones made better. Within a few years of its incorporation the' dis- trict was divided into six squadrons, as these sub- divisions were called, for school purposes, and a school-house, rough and rnde of course, was built in each.
363
CARLISLE.
From this time for many years no events of importance took place in the district, excepting such as may hereafter be noticed in the miscella- neous history. In 1803 the district was, by act of the legislature, disconnected from Acton and invested with all the rights and privileges of a town. In the War of IS12 the town heartily, and with entire unanimity, sustained the action of the general government, and promptly responded to its call for men to form and recruit the military forces.
In the War of the Rebellion Carlisle was not behind her sister towns in loyalty and devotion to the government, or in the promptness with which she furnished men to answer its calls. The first action taken upon war matters was May 11, 1861, when it was voted to pay each volunteer nine dol- lars a month in addition to his government pay, the number not to exceed ten, and the payment to continue for one year. July 21, 1862, it was "voted to pay $100 bounty to nine three-years volunteers who shall be credited to the town." August 27 the town voted $100 to nine-months men, afterward raised to $150. September 8 it " voted to pay the three-years men credited to the quota of the town, who have enlisted without bounty and are now in service, $100." This vote was re- newed October 6, but the obligation was afterward repudiated by the town authorities, upon a legal technicality, and their action was subsequently sus- tained by a majority vote of the town. April 6, 1863, the selectmen were authorized to pay state aid at the rate of six dollars a month to the fami- lies of deceased soldiers, and to those who should be disabled by disease. April 4, 1861, it was " voted to pay a bounty of $125 in gold to each three-years volunteer, and drafted men when cred- ited to the quota of the town." August 13 the selectmen were authorized to enlist as many men " as they may think necessary to fill the quota of the town that may hereafter be made before March 5, 1865." The records of which the above is an abstract give no reliable information of the number of men called for or furnished for the service, or the amount of money expended for war purposes. Neither is the " Soldiers' Record Book," a carefully prepared register furnished by the state, more full and complete. It contains the names of but little over half the number that enlisted from the town, and only a few of these have any other record than that they were enlisted and discharged from ser- vice. From a report of Adjutant-General Schou-
ler, made at the close of the war, it appears that Carlisle furnished seventy-four men for the war, which was a surplus of two over and above all demands, and that the whole amount of money ap- propriated and expended on account of the war, exclusive of state aid, was $10,724.90; and that the amount of aid furnished soldiers' families and afterward repaid by the state was $7,515.97. The accuracy of this report has been questioned, and a claim made that more men were furnished by the town than the number credited. But in the absence of any evidence from the town records to its discredit, it should of course be taken as truc. The seventy-four men here reported included nearly all the able-bodied young men between seventeen and thirty-five in the town. From motives of patriotism, they promptly responded to the call of the government, many of them without the stimu- lants of offered bounty ; and went forth to fight and bleed and die, as many of them did, on South- ern battle-fields. It is deeply to be regretted that so little pains have been taken by town officials to transmit their names and their deeds, or to fulfil pledges long ago made.
The following is a list of the names of some (probably not all) of those who were killed, or died in the service, or who were wounded, and were part of the town's quota of three years.
Timothy W. Heald was in the 6th regiment on its passage through Baltimore ; he re-enlisted in the first company of sharp-shooters, March 24, 1862 ; was wounded at Yorktown, October 21, of the same year, and discharged for disability. John N. Blood, 16th regiment, was wounded at Gettysburg and discharged for disability. William Blood, 16th regiment, was killed at Bull Run, 1862. William F. Litchfield, 16th regiment, served in the Army of the Potomac three years, was wounded at Spottsyl- vania, Va., May 11, 1864. Daniel W. Robbins, 16th regiment, served three years, was wounded at Spottsylvania, May 10, 1861; re-enlisted December 25, 1864, and served to the close of the war. Warren P. Locke, 32d regiment, was killed June 3, 1864, at Bethesda Church, Va. George P. Nickles, 32d regiment, was wounded in the Battle of the Wilderness, and discharged at expiration of service. Miranda Dutton, 33d regiment, was killed at Lookout Valley, May 25, 1864. Austin M. Heald, first company of sharpshooters, died at Falmouth, Va., December 30, 1862. William Moore, first company of sharpshooters, died at Fort McHenry, March 2, 1863. John Q. Adams,
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