History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 86

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226

USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II > Part 86

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Litchfield, the intervale lands of which, along the Merrimack, were cultivated by the Penacook Indians, a tribe more warlike than the other Pawtucket In- dians, was settled about 1720, and was incorporated as a township in 1734 by the General Assembly of Massachusetts. In the days of the Revolutionary War, out of fifty-seven men of age for military ser- vice, it furnished its quota of seven for the service of the country. Among the early inhabitants of the town Hon. Wiseman Claggett is mentioned with spe- cial honor. He was born in Bristol, England, his father being a wealthy barrister. He was bred to the law. After ten years spent in seeking his fortune in the West Indies, he came to New England, and, at the age of thirty-seven years, established himself at Portsmouth, N. H. At the age of fifty-four years he

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was appointed by the British Government attorney- general of the Province of New Hampshire. Hav- ing, however, espoused the cause of the Colonies in the years preceding the Revolutionary War, he was removed from his office, and he settled upon a farm in Litchfield. Here he was a member of the Coun- cil and the Committee of Safety in the time of the war. He represented Litchfield and other towns in the New Hampshire Legislature. "He was a clas- sical scholar, a good lawyer, a wit and a poet." The collections of the New Hampshire Historical Society contain an interesting biography of him written by the Hon. Charles H. Atherton.

The town of Merrimack was set off from the Dun- stable grant in 1733, first under the name of "Sou- hegan East," afterwards "Rumford," and at length Merrimack. It was settled in 1722. John Cromwell, the Indian trader, heretofore mentioned, built a trading-house at Cromwell's Falls in this town about 1670. The Souhegan River, which runs through the town, affords a water-power. The mills which were erected at the water-fall in 1818 afterwards were consumed in succession by fire. The disaster seems to have long discouraged attempts to improve the water-power. The Hon. Matthew Thornton, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was for many of the last years of his life a citizen of Merrimack. He was born in Ireland and came to America at an early age, practicing as a physician until the Revolutionary War. He held the military office of colonel, and in 1775 was president of the convention at Exeter, which assumed the government of the Colony. He was in 1776 a delegate in Con- gress at Philadelphia, and thus became one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. He was subsequently a member of Congress, both as

Representative and Senator from New Hampshire. He also held the office of judge of the Supreme Court of the State. He died at Newburyport, Mass., in 1803, while on a visit to that city. His age was eighty-eight years. His grandson, James B. Thorn- ton, who died at the early age of thirty-eight years, was a young man of high promise, having been Speaker of the House of Representatives of New Hampshire, second comptroller of the United States Treasury and charge d'affaires of the United States at Callao, Peru.

The township of Hollis, whose Indian name was Nisitisset, was set off from the Dunstable grant as the West Parish of Dunstable in 1739, and was soon after incorporated as a town with the name of Hollis. The town was first settled in 1730 by Capt. Peter Powers, one of the soldiers, who under Capt. Lovewell fought that bloody battle with the Indians in Fryeburg, Maine, so well known in history and song. Two years after his marriage, the soldier, with his young wife, crossed the Nashua River from Dunstable, and built the first cabin in Hollis. The remains of the cabin were visible in 1830. Soon

followed other settlers, and in 1736 Hollis had nine families. Fox, the historian of Dunstable, gives us the muster-roll of a military company made up from Hollis, Nashua and vicinity, in the old French War. The company consisted of nearly sixty men, and had Peter Powers, of Hollis, for its captain. Hollis also had a company of seventy men at the battle of Bunker Hill under Capt. Reuben Dow. This com- pany, under the command of Col. Stark and Col. Prescott, were in the thickest of the fight and lost seven men. The soldiers of Hollis also participated in the military operations at Ticonderoga and Ben- nington, the town having during the war furnished 250 men, of whom thirty died in the service. Up to 1823 thirty-five young men of Hollis had graduated from Harvard, Dartmouth and other colleges.

In 1740 "the broad and good plantation " of Old Dunstable was reduced to that portion only which is now embraced in the towns of Nashua, Nashville, Dunstable and Tyngsborough. But in 1741 it suf- fered a still further reduction, for in that year, after a long dispute, the boundary line between Massachu- setts and New Hampshire was fixed. This line sep- arated the already reduced plantation into two nearly equal parts. The part which fell to New Hampshire was called Nashua, which, 101 years afterwards (in 1842) was itself divided, the northern part taking the name of Nashville.

Of all the sub-divisions of the old Dunstable plan- tation Nashua has had by far the greatest prosperity and the most rapid growth. The vast hydraulic power afforded it by the fall of sixty-five feet in the Nashua River within the distance of two miles, has made the city of Nashua one of the most important manufacturing places in the nation.

Nashville, situated on the north side of the Nashua River, shares with Nashua the benefits of the water- power. The Jackson Manufacturing Company and other extensive works make it a thriving town.

In 1675, only two years after the plantation of Dunstable received its charter, began King Philip's War, in which the inhabitants of Tyngsborough bore a conspicuous part both in respect to the sufferings which they endured and the bravery with which they waged the . conflict. This war demands our especial attention from the fact that while in other Indian wars the red men engaged in petty acts of cruelty and . revenge, as local hostilities grew up between the two races, or else in subordination to the French partici- pated in the wars which had arisen between the French and English people, in this bloody and fearful conflict almost all the Indian tribes of New England, impelled by one common impulse, acting upon one common plan, led on by one leader of consummate skill and undaunted courage, had united with the avowed purpose and firm resolve of exterminating by fire and the tomahawk every trace of the settlements of the white men throughout the land. The war was waged not for victory, but for annihilation. There

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was to be no quarter and no mercy. The little child was not to be spared for his innocence, nor delicate woman for her loveliness. It was a war not of re- venge alone, but of cold, settled, well-matured policy, whose success was to be secured not by open conflict, but by infamous treachery, not by a disciplined sol- diery, but by fiends and "hell-hounds" of war. This war continued one year. The plantation of Dunsta- ble, being on the frontier, being very sparsely settled having on the north the warlike Pennacooks and on the south the Wamesits, was specially exposed to attack. To add to the alarm the heretofore friendly Wannalancet withdrew from Wamesit. His flight betokened war.

Seven Narragansett Indians, who for seven weeks had worked for Jonathan Tyng, of Tyngsborough, having received their wages, stealthily departed. In their distress the settlers appeal for help, from the Colony, and eighteen men are sent by Captain Mose- ley to protect them. In September Lieutenants Brat- tle and Henchman were ordered by the Governor to take measures to defend the settlement. Wannalan- cet was reached by scouts and urged to return, but he persistently refused. Captain Moseley, with a hun- dred men, marched to Pennacook (now Concord) and to Naticook (now Litchfield) to disperse the hostile Indians in those places. While in the forest they fell into an ambuscade in which they might easily have been cut off. Their escape has been attributed to the persuasion of the friendly Wannalancet, who, in his flight, forgot not his friendship to the white man. The dying speech of his father, the aged chief Passaconaway, in which he was implored "to take heed how he quarreled with the English," seems to have restrained him. Decisive proof that Wanna- lancet, in his flight and wanderings, did restrain the warlike Indians from destroying the whites is found in what he said, after the war, to the Rev. Mr. Fiske, the pastor of the Chelmsford Church. When Mr. Fiske remarked to Wannalancet that he desired to thank God that during the war his people had been so highly favored, the chief replied : " Me next."

But although, by order of the Governor, garrisons were established and troops were sent for the defence of the settlers, every house on the plantation, with one exception, was deserted by its inmates. That excep- tion is worthy of record among the grandest deeds of human bravery. Jonathan Tyng had established his home on the banks of the Merrimack near Wica- suck Island, about a mile below the present village of Tyngsborough. He was the son of the Hon. Edward and Mary Tyng, from the latter of whom the planta- tion of Dunstable received its name, she having come from Dunstable, England. The parents of Jonathan Tyng first settled in Boston, but had removed to the plantation, probably to Tyngsborough, where the father died in 1681, at the age of seventy-one years. His grave is in the old Tyng burying-ground, near the village of Tyngsborough. Jonathan Tyng, the son,

who was then thirty-three years of age, disdained to flee. Alone in the wilderness, while during the long and fearful winter the war waged around, he made his house his garrison, and held his ground. He believed it to be for the common good that the plantation should not be utterly deserted, and he bravely remained at the post where duty called him to stand. Well may the town of Tyngsborough and the honored Tyng family be forever proud of such a conspicuous example of bravery. Mr. Tyng having, during the winter of 1675, been the only white settler on the Dunstable grant, seems to give to Tyngsborough the honor of being permanently settled earliest of all the towns which composed the plantation.

Although Mr. Tyng, in his petition to the General Court, in the time of greatest peril, declares "there is never an inhabitant left in the town but myself," we cannot suppose that he was the only tenant of the house during those months of impending danger, for he was a man who largely employed the service of others. We have just told of seven Narragansett In- dians who left his employ, and we read also of one Robert Parris " who is Mr. Tyng's vail." Moreover, in this petition he uses the word " we" instead of "I" in reference to the tenants of his garrison. This peti- tion was dated February 3, 1676, and reads as follows :

" The petition of Jonathan Tyng Humhly sheweth : That ye Peti- tioner, living in the uppermost house on Merrimack river, lying open to the enemy, yet heing so seated that it is, as it were, a watch-house to the neighboring towns, from whence we can easily give them notice of the approach of the enemy, and may also he of use to the publique in many respects ; also are near to the place of the Indian's ffishing, from which, in the season thereof, they have great supplies, which I douht not we may he a great means of preventing them thereof; and there heing never an inhahitant left in the town hut myself :

"Wherefore your petitioner doth humhly request that your Honours would he pleased to order him three or four men to help garrison his said house, which he has heen of great charge to ffortify, and may he of ser- vice to the publique : Your favour therein shall further ohlige me as in duty hound to pray for a blessing on your Councils, and remain your Honourahles' humble servant, JONATHAN TYNG."

This petition was dictated by discretion-not by cowardice, for the enemy was near. In this very month of February the Indians attacked the adjoin- ing town of Chelmsford, burning several buildings, and in the following month made still another attack upon that place, wounding Joseph Parker, the consta- ble of the town of Dunstable. In reply to the peti- tion the General Court immediately dispatched to Mr. Tyng a guard of several men, who remained with him during the war.

It is a significant mark of the utter desolation of the plantation during that winter of terror that Mr. Tyng was compelled to send to Boston for the neces- sary provisions for supplying his little garrison. Mr. Tyng was not attacked during the winter, and in the spring, by order of the Governor and Council, a gar- rison was established at Pawtucket Falls, and this, to- gether with a force stationed at Capt. Henchman's house in Chelmsford, secured the brave man from further danger.

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The war soon closed. It was begun with much to flatter the red man with hopes of victory. It had for its leader a crafty, skillful and courageous chief, Philip, son of Massasoit, once the generous friend of the Pilgrims of Plymouth. The alliance with the Narragansetts, a powerful tribe, gave firmness and strength to the cause. Their fort, manned by 4000 warriors, was doubtless deemed impregnable, but, in December, 1675, one thousand troops under the lead- ership of Josiah Winslow, son of Governor Winslow, stormed the fort and utterly destroyed their village and all their stores. His allies being thus conquered, Philip retired to his home on Mount Hope, near Bristol, R. I., where he was attacked and slain in August, 1676, his head being sent to Plymouth, where it was fixed upon a gibbet for many years as a warning to his country- men. This war, so short, yet so atrocious and bloody, fell mainly upon the two colonies of Massachusetts. When we consider how few in number and how feeble in resources these colonists were, the ruin caused by the war is almost appalling. Thirteen towns were burned, 600 buildings were laid in ashes, 600 colon- ists were slain, and a million of dollars expended.

Although in subsequent years Indians were employ- ed in the fiendish work of treachery and murder in the wars of the white men, the war of King Philip was the last effort of the Indian tribes to blot out the settlements of the white man in New England.

After the war a party of the Praying Indians at Wamesit on the Concord River, about sixty in number, were removed to Tyngsborough, and placed in charge of Col. Jonathan Tyng. They occupied Wicasuck Island and its vicinity for about ten years, and then departed to St. Francis, in Canada. In 1686 this isl- and was granted to Col. Tyng to compensate him for his care of them. It seems to have been the part of the town of Tyngsborough to have been the earliest home, in the Dunstable plantation, of the permanent white settlers, and the latest home of the sons of the forest. It was in this year (1686) that the Wamesit and Naticook Indians sold to Col. Tyng all their pos- sessions in the neighborhood. This purchase, togeth- er with 3500 acres received of his father, Edward Tyng, in 1668, and 1800 acres granted by the proprie- tors of the township in discharge of a debt of about $75, made Col. Tyng by far the largest landholder in the region. This land together with other large addi- tions, extended six miles from the Merrimack River, the tract being one mile wide. Until recent years it remained in the possession of the Tyng and Brinley families. Upon this subject Mr. Nason remarks : "It is, perhaps, the only instance in Massachusetts where such an extensive territorial domain has remained so long undivided and under the control of the descendants of the original proprietor." This tract constituted a very large portion of the territory of Tyngsborough. It is questionable whether such a tenure of land has been favorable to the development and welfare of the town.

Having brought the valiant Col. Tyng so promi- nently before the reader's mind, it is here proper that we should give a brief sketch of what remains untold of the history of this distinguished man.

His father was Hon. Edward Tyng, who was born in Dunstable, England, in 1610, and at the age of twenty- nine years came to America and settled as a mer- chant in Boston, where he held, as a citizen, positions of honor. He represented Boston in the General Court in 1661 and 1662, was colonel of the Suffolk Regiment, and held the office of assistant from 1668 to 1681.

The opinion seems to have been entertained that the vast Tyng or Brinley estate in Tyngsborough, having an area of six square miles, had for its founder, not Edward Tyng, but his distinguished son, Col. Jonathan Tyng. This opinion has been contro- verted by the researches of Judge William A. Rich- ardson, who has found that Edward Tyng, who was a merchant both in London and in Boston, purchased in 1660, thirteen years before the incorporation of the Dunstable plantation, a tract of land from James Parker, of Chelmsford, containing 3000 acres. This tract, together with 500 acres otherwise acquired, was given by deed to his son, Col. Jonathan Tyng, in 1668, and forms the foundation of the great Tyng estate.

The deed of this land, given by Parker to Edward Tyng, is written on parchment and is in the posses- sion of Judge Richardson. This interesting docu- ment, written in fair and legible hand, was dated August 14, 1660, and is therefore 230 years old. The portion of this deed which gives the history of the transfer of the land by the Indians to James Parker has a unique interest, and I therefore give it here for the edification of the reader :

" To all people to whom this present shall come to he seen or read, James Parker, of Chelmsford, in the County of Middlesex, in New Eng- land, yeoman, and Elisabeth, his wife, sends Greeting : Whereas, the Honnered Gennerall Court of the Massachusetts jurisdiction in new England, aforesayd, of their benefficent hounty did Give and Grant unto. the Indians of Patuckett a parcell of land adjoyning to the bounds of chelmsford Plantation, and Whereas, Puntalihun John Tohatowon Pa- mobotiquin Wonoint Nomphon Rulinansad Peter and Wampamooun, cheif Indians of said Pauhtuket, at a lawfull public meeting of theirs, the fourtenth of the third moneth, 1660, with the approbation of John Elliott, senr., teacher of the church of Christ in Roxbury, did Give and Grant unto the above Mentioned James Parker, a certain parcell of land part of the above mentioned Graunt, lying and heing at the west end of their sd Graunt, out of the hounds both of the sayd Pauatukit and chelmsford, in relation of any exchainges hy them made to each other, and that In Considerations of the great pains and costs, the sayd James Parker hath heen at for the setling of the hounds according to Agree- ments with the Indians of sayd Pauatucket and Inhabitants of chelms- ford, as in a deed hearing date the third of April, 1660, with the Records of the Generall Court concerning the same more amply appeareth. Now Know all men by these presents, that the sayd James Parker and Elise- heth, his wife, in consideration of sixty pounds to him payd in hand by Edward Tyng, of Boston, &c., &c."

The following is a quotation from an article writ- ten by Judge Richardson for the Lowell Daily Courier, April 4, 1881 :

" It is understood that his [Edward Tyng's] wife, Mary Sears, was

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born in Dunstable, England, from which place the old township [of Dunstable] took its name in honor of her. Mr. Tyng was a benefactor of the college [Harvard], to a small extent, as early as 1658, according to President Quincy's ' History of Harvard University,' and Mr. Quincy re" fers to him as of 'one of tho earliest, wealthiest and most influential families in the Colony.' Ilis second daughter, Rebecca, married Joseph Dudley, who was the Colonial Governor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, and Chief Justice of tho Supreme Court of New York ; his third daughter, Ilannah, married Abijah Savage, a graduate of Harvard in 1659 ; his fourth danghter, Eunice, was the wife of Samuel Willard, who was vice-president and acting president of the college from 1701 to 1707. The landed estate of Edward was given to his only son Jonathan, who resided upon it and was a man of much distinction and influence."

Two years before his death, Edward Tyng, then sixty-nine years of age, came from Boston and set- tled probably near the residence of his son, in Tyngs- borough. He died in 1681 aud was buried in the old Tyng burial-ground, about one mile below the village of Tyngsborough. His grave is covered with a granite slab, on which is the following inscription : " Here lyeth the body of Mr. Edward Tyng, Esq., aged 71 years. Died December 17 Day 1681."

Edward Tyng left six children-Jonathan, who will be noticed elsewhere. 2. Edward, who was one of Sir Edmund Andros' Council and governor of Annapolis. 3. Hannah, who married Habijah Sav- age, son of the celebrated Major Thomas Savage, commander-in-chief in King Philip's War. 4. Eunice, who married Samuel Willard, pastor of Old South Church in Boston and vice-president and acting president of Harvard College. 5. Rebecca, wife of Joseph Dudley, Governor of Massachusetts and chief justice of New York. 6. A daughter who married a Searle, her son, Samuel Searle, being mentioned in Mr. Tyng's will.

The will of Edward Tyng, which is dated August 25, 1677, four years before his death, clearly indicates, when we consider the times and the high value of a pound sterling in those days, that he was a man of large estate. His oldest son, Jonathan, is not men- tioned in this will for the obvious reason that his father had already given to him a very large estate. To his son Edward he gives 100 pounds, adding the words: " having given him a considerable estate already." He gives his daughter Eunice 500 pounds, and to each of his nine grandchildren 100 pounds, to be paid after the decease of his wife. His wife is made executrix and is to be assisted by the following four "overseers :" Hon. Edward Friend, John Leverett, Esq., Anthony Stoddard and Capt. Thomas Brattle. The number and rank of these "overseers" indicate that the widow was placed in charge of an estate whose settlement was a work of no ordinary responsibility. Indeed, it is highly probable that his widow had herself inherited an estate, and this estate may have constituted a portion of her husband's wealth. The fact that Dunstable received its name in compliment to her, and the other significant fact that so many of her daughters married men who occu- pied high social and political positions, seem to in- dicate that birth or wealth, or both, had given her a higli claim to peculiar honor.

Col. Jonathan Tyng, son of Edward Tyng, was born in 1642, three years after his father had settled in Boston. Early in life he settled on the banks of the Merrimack, on lands in the Dunstable plantation, now belonging to the town of Tyngsborough, and, as already shown, was the first permanent settler of the plantation. The exalted character of the man is shown, not only by his own brave deeds, but by the offices of trust and honor bestowed upon him through life. He was made guardian of the Wamesit Indians; he was a member of the Council of Sir Edmund Andros, the royal Governor; he represented Dunstable in the General Court; he was for many years selectman of the town; he was colonel of the upper Middlesex regiment, and was entrusted with the care of all the garrisons within its bounds. He was always at the front. He held a high position in the church and was sternly orthodox. We must, however, be im- partial. One act of the gallant colonel will hardly meet the approval of this liberal age. John Ather- ton, a soldier belonging to Col. Tyng's company, was fined forty shillings by the colonel for wetting a piece of an old hat on the Sabbath day for the sake of putting it into his shoe, which chafed his foot while on the march. To one who believes that a man of so noble a nature actually committed an act apparently® so unjust, it is sufficient to say that the act was fully justified by the spirit of the age, and the punishment by fine was infinitely less severe than that inflicted by the Mosaic law, so much revered by our fathers. For the man who was found, as recorded in the book of Numbers, gathering sticks upon the Sabbath, was "stoned with stones " until he died. The fault of the good and brave colonel was that he was not a century in advance of his time. Indeed his act, when stated abstractly, does not appear so very severe. A small fine of less than seven dollars was imposed to prevent cobbling on the Sabbath day. Moreover, the act of the soldier may have been repeated in defiance of previous warnings and admonitions and under circumstances insulting to his commander and sub- versive of his authority.

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History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. II, Part 86

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1226

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed. cn
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia : J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1226