History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III, Part 107

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co
Number of Pages: 1278

USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III > Part 107

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).

In 1841 he married Susan Newton, a resident of Holliston, but a native of Shrewsbury, Mass. They had two children, but neither have survived. An adopted son is in business in Boston.

Mr. Harriman was a member of the Board of As- sessors for two years. He joined the Methodist. Church in 1845, and ever afterwards led a consistent Christian life. He was for many years a trustee and steward of that church, and was one of its chief financial sup- porters. He was also for some time the superintend- eut of its Sunday-school.

Mr. Harriman was an active business man and he secured the good will of all with whom he had deal- ings. Although reserved in his conversation concern- ing matters of business, he had the good tact to manage it successfully, and succeeded in accumula- ting a handsome competency. He was a favorite with his workmen, who attended his funeral in a body and keenly felt his loss. He died September 12, 1879.

ZEPHANIAI TALBOT.

Mr. Talbot was born in South Hanover, Mass., June 22, 1834. He was educated in the pubhe schools and in Hanover Academy, and then as a full apprentice in the Corliss Steam Engine Co.,

1 Contributed.

456

HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

at Providence, Rhode Island. He was a staff officer in the United States Navy, from 1860 to 1866, being assistant engineer. Applying for duty in active service, he was ordered to proceed from San Francisco to the North. He received two promotions and served as chief engineer on the Gunboats Cho- cura and Iosco, and superintended the placing of the engines in them. He was on duty in the North At- lantic blockading squadron and was present at the capture of Fort Fisher. He continued in the service after the close of the war, and was appointed first as- sistant professor of steam-engineering at the Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md., this branch being then first introduced as a study. In the year 1866, he re- signed his office for the purpose of entering business.

Mr. Talbot's first connection with Mr. D. K. Stet- son was at Woodville, Hopkinton, Mass., in the man- ufacture of shoe nails and tacks. In the year 1866, they removed to Holliston, established themselves on the site of the old comb factory in East Holliston, where as Stetson & Talbot, they continued the above mentioned business for twenty-one years. In 1887 Mr. Talbot purchased the interest of Mr. Stetson and has since conducted the business himself. A refer- ence to the description of this industry in another part of this article, will show the magnitude of the business. He has obtained one patent and applied for three others connected with this manufacture.

Mr. Talbot was a member of the Board of Select- men in 1866 ; chairman of the Board of Assessors four years, from 1876; and a member of the school com- mittee for ten years, a portion of that time as chair- man. He was also a director of the National Bank and Trustee of the Savings Bank for several years. In 1882 he was chosen treasurer of the Holliston Mills, and has continued to occupy that post. He has also been treasurer and a director of the Hollis- ton Water Company since its first incorporation in 1884.

In May, 1863, he was married to Eliza F. Paul, of Boston. They have had four children, one of whom, Henry P., after a course of study at the Institute of Technology, in Boston, proceeded to Europe for fur- ther education, and in 1890 took the degree of Ph.D. at Leipsic.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

MALDEN.

BY WILLIAM T. DAVIS.

MALDEN was originally a part of Charlestown. Charlestown was first visited, as far as is certainly known, by John Smith in 1614. There is no evidence that earlier explorers, including Verazzano, Gosnold, Martin Pring, Waymouth, Champlain and Hudson, either entered the harbor of Boston, or even saw its

adjacent lands. John Smith, after some years' connec- tion with the Southern Virginia Company, returned to England, and in 1614 sailed with two ships " to take whales and also to make trials of a mine of gold and copper." On his arrival at Monhegan, near the mouth of the Penobscot River, he anchored his vessels and sailed with eight men in a shallop, along the more southerly coast as far as Cape Cod, giving the name of New England to the country, and " drawing a map from point to point, isle to iste, and harbor to harbor, with the soundings, sands, rocks and landmarks." A copy of this map was submitted by Smith, on his return to England, to Prince Charles, afterwards Charles the First, who attached names to the various points there delineated. Of these names, Plymouth, named, it is believed, in honor of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, at that time Governor at the castle in Plymouth, and one of Smith's patrons; Cape Anne, named after Anne of Denmark, the mother of the Prince, and Charles River, named after himself, re- main, while all the other names, including Cape James for Cape Cod, Milford Haven for Provincetown Harbor, Stuard's Bay for Barnstable Bay, Point George for Brant Point, Oxford for Marshfield, London for Cohasset, Cheviot Hills for the Blue Hills, Talbott's Bay for Gloucester Harbor, and Dartmouth, Sandwich and Cambridge, for places near Portland, never came into use.

Smith was followed by Thomas Dermer, in 1619, who put into Massachusetts Bay, and visited Plym- outh, but there is no evidence that he sighted the northerly shore ofthe bay. The "Mayflower" followed in 1620, the "Fortune" in 1621, the " Ann" and " Little James," in 1623, all making Plymouth their only destination, and in the last of these years Robert Gorges, appointed Lieutenant-General of New Eng- land, came in a ship which was the pioneer in the great movement which ended in the settlement of the Massachusetts Colony. All the enterprises connected with these arrivals on the New England coast were conducted under the authority of an English com- pany, first known as the Northern Virginia Company, and afterwards as "The council established at Plymouth, in the county of Devon, for the planting, ordering, ruling and governing of New England in America."

This company, together with the Southern Virginia Company, or, as it was called, the Virginia Company, was established in 1606. On the 10th of April in that year King James divided by letters patent between these two companies, a strip of land one hundred miles wide, along the Atlantic coast of North Amer- ica, extending from the thirty-fourth to the forty- fifth degree of north latitude, a territory which then went under the name of Virginia. This territory ex- tended from Cape Fear to Passamaquoddy Bay. The patent, or charter, to the Virginia Company was granted to certain knights, gentlemen, merchants and adventurers of London, who were permitted to

457

MALDEN.

claim between the the thirty-fourth and forty-first degrees, or between Cape Fear and a point within the boundaries of New York harbor. The patent, or charter, to the Northern Virginia Company was grant- ed to knights, gentlemen, merchants and adventurers of Bristol, Exeter and Plymouth, who were permitted to claim between the thirty-eighth and forty-fifth de- grees, or between the southeastern corner of Maryland and Passamaquoddy Bay. That portion of the strip between the thirty-eighth and forty-first degrees in- cluded in both patents, was open to the company first occupying it, and neither company was permitted to make a settlement within one hundred miles of a settlement of the other company.

In 1620, the King having become displeased with Sir Edwin Sandys, the Governor and Treasurer of the Southern Company, forbade his re-election, but his successor, the Earl of Southampton, being no less obnoxious, he was disposed to show special favor to the Northern Company, and granted it a new act of incorporation under the title, already referred to, of " The conncil established at Plymouth, in the county of Devon, for the planting, ordering and governing of New England in America." Under their new charter a new grant was made to the company, ex- tending from the Atlantic to the Pacific and bounded by the fortieth and forty eighth degrees of latitude.

Under the authority of this company the settlement of the Massachusetts Colony was made. In 1622 they granted to Robert Gorges all that part of the terri- tory " commonly called or known by the name of the Massachusiack upon the northeaside of the Bay called or known by the name of the Massachusett." This grant, according to the best authorities, included the region about Boston harbor, bounded on one side by Nahant and on the other by Point Allerton, and ex- tending thirty miles into the interior, "with all the rivers, islands, minerals, etc.," within its limits. This grant included, of course, the territory afterwards occu- pied by the town of Charlestown, and Charlestown when settled included Malden, Everett, Melrose, Woburn, Stoneham, Burlington, Somerville, a large part of Med- ford and a small part of Cambridge, West Cambridge and Reading, Arlington, Lexington and Winchester.

In 1623 Robert Gorges, as has been already stated, was appointed by the Plymouth Council, Lieutenant- General of New England, and came over to secure his grant and establish a colony. In the next year, hav- ing failed in his colonial enterprise, he returned to England " until better occasion should offer itself unto him." It is probable that on his departure he left some remnants of his colony behind, as in 1626 there were planters at "Winnissemit," and as William Blackstone, the first settler of Boston, appears in the records as the agent of Gorges in 1626, and others con- nected with him and his enterprise were at abont the same date inhabitants of what was later the Massa chnsetts Colony.

After the death of Robert Gorges his older brother

John, to whom his grant descended, leased, in or about 1628, a part of the land claimed by him to John Old- ham and John Dorrill. This lease included the terri- tory afterward embraced within the limits of Char es- town, and covered " all the lands within the Massa- chusetts Bay, between Charles River and Abousett (or Saugus) River, containing in length by straight line, four miles up the Charles River, with the main land northwest from the border of said Bay, including all creeks and points by the way; and three miles in length from the month of the foresaid river Abousett up into the main land, npon a straight line southwest, incinding all creeks and points ; and all the land in breadth and length between the foresaid rivers, with all prerogatives, royal mines excepted."

In 1628 the council for Plymouth, the suceessor of the old Northern Virginia Company, notwithstanding the grant they had made to Robert Gorges in 1622, under which Oldham and Dorrell claimed as lessees, sold the territory included in that grant to the Mas- sachusetts Colony, bounding the lands conveyed by points three miles north of the Merrimack River and three miles south of the Charles River, and extend- ing from the Atlantic Ocean to the South Sea. Old- ham, of course, protested against this sale of lands to which he had reason to believe that he was right- fully entitled, but for some reason the Plymouth Council held the claim to be void and disregarded it. On September 6, 1628, John Endieott arrived in Salem, as the representative and local Governor of the Massachusetts Colony. Included among the mem- bers of the company arriving with Endicott, accord- ing to some authorities, were Ralph Spragne and his brothers Richard and William, who, not long after their arrival set out on an expedition, during which they traveled about twelve miles to the westward from Nahumkeik (now Salem) and “ lighted of a place situate and lyeing on the north side of the Charles River full of Indians called Aberginians." It is said that by this baud of adventurers it was agreed, with the approbation of Governor Endicott, " that this place on the north side of the Charles River, by the natives called Mishawum, shall henceforth, from the name of the river, be called Charlestown."

But anthorities differ as to the place, time and man- ner of the settlement of Charlestown, and as to the persons by whom it was settled. Besides the lease of lands to John Oldbam and John Dorrell, there was a claim made by Sir William Brereton, under a deed dated January 10, 1629, of "all the land in breadth lyeinge from ye east side of Charles River to the easterly parte off the cape called Nahante, and all the lands lyeinge in length twenty miles northeast into ye maine land from the mouth of the said Charles River lyeing also in length twenty miles into the maine land northeast from ye said Cape Nahante ; also two Islands lyeinge next unto the shore between Nahante and Charles River, the bigger called Brereton, and the lesser, Susanna." This claim also was rejected by the

458

HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

Plymouth Council, and the Massachusetts Company in England sent a letter to Endicott by the "George Bonaventure," which arrived in Salem June 22, 1629, from which the following is an extract :

" We pray you and the council there to advise seriously together for the maintenance of our privileges and peaceable government, which, if it may be done by a temperate course, we much desire it, though with some inconvenience, suas our government and privileges be not brought in contempt, wishing rather there might be such a noion as might draw the heathen by our good example to the embracing of Christ and his Kuspel than that offence should by given to the heathen, and a scandal to our religion through our disagreement amongst ourselves. But if necessity require a more severe course where fair meade will not prevail. we pray yoo to deal, as in your discretions you shall think fittest for the general good and safety of the plantation and preservation of our priv- ileges. And because we would not omit to do anything which might strengthen our right, we would have you (as soon as these ships, or any of them, arrive with you, whereby you may have men to do it) send forty or fifty persons to Massachusetts Bay to inbabit there, which we pray you not to protract, but to do it with all speed ; and if any of our company in particular shall desire to settle themselves there, or to send servants thither, we desire all accommodation and encouragement may be given them therennto, whereby the better to strengthen our posses- sion there against all or any that shull intrude upon us, which we would not have yon, by any means, give way unto ; with this cautioo notwith- standing-That for such of our countrymen as you find there planted, so as they be willing to live under our government, you endeavor to give them all fitting and due accommodation as to any of ourselves ; yea, if you see cause for it, though it be with more than ordinary privileges in point of trade."

Immediately after the arrival of the ships referred to in the above letter, Thomas Greaves and Rev. Francis Bright, with a party of colonists, were dis- patched for Massachusetts Bay to take possession of the lands included in their patent and silence the claims of Oldham and Dorrell and Brereton. The precise date of their arrival at Charlestown is render- ed doubtful by the uncertain statements of different historians. It is probable that Thomas Greaves and the letter from which the above extract is taken arrived at Salem in the "George Bonaventure" on the 22d of June. It seems also probable that lligginson and Bright arrived in the " Talbot " and " Lion's Whelp " on the 29th of June, and yet the con- clusion reached by Frothingham, in his " History of Charlestown," is that Greaves and Bright reached Charlestown on their expedition from Salem on the 24th of June. It does not even appear sure that Ralph and Richard and William Sprague, already referred to as settlers of Charlestown, were not companions of Greaves and Wright, instead of their forerunners. At any rate, it is certain that about the last of June or the first of July, the settlement of Charlestown was definitely made, and during the year 1629 Higginson wrote: "There are in all of us, both old and new planters, abont three hundred, whereof two hundred of them are settled at Neihum-kek, now called Salem; and the rest have planted themselves at Masathulets Bay, beginning to build a towne there which wee doo call Cherton on Charles Towne." There seems, however, to be a concurrence of opinion, after attempts to reconcile conflicting statements, that the day of the arrival of Grenves, the agent of the Massachusetts

Colony, at Charlestown, was June 24th, old style, or July 4th, new style, and that therefore that is the date of the foundation and settlement of the town.

At this place a settlement was made with the con- sent of John Sagamore, the local native chief of a tribe of the Pawtucket-, a chief " of gentle and good disposition, a handsome young man conversant with us," as Thomas Dudley said, "affecting English ap- parel and houses, and speaking well of our God."

On the arrival of a second company following the lead of Endicott about one-third of the number more than one hundred in all, proceeded to Charles- town. On the arrival of Winthrop, in 1630, with a company of fifteen hundred persons, in a well-equipped fleet fitted out in England at an expense of more than twenty-one thousand pounds sterling, the Charles and Mystic Rivers were speedily explored, and Charles- town was selected as the place for the settlement of the Massachusetts Colony. At that time the proxim- ity to tide-water, the two rivers, the Charles and Mystic, and the scattered lands which had been cleared by the natives, made the spot as attractive as any which could be found in the territory of New England. The presence of the Indians was, however, a constant menace to the peace and safety of the settlement, which demanded the utmost sagacity and watchfulness to guard against, Sagamore John made his home upon the creek which runs from the marshes between Powder Horn Hill and Winnisimmet into the Mystic. While he was the nominal ruler of the tribe, his mother, the Squaw Sachem and the widow of Nanapashemet, the old ruler, was the actual head of the tribe.

During the prevalence of small-pox in 1632, the Squaw Sachem and her two sons, Sagamore John and Sagamore James, died, and Wenepoygen, a younger brother, became chief. Ile was given by the settlers the name of George Rumney Marsh, from the place where he lived, on the southern border of the present town of Malden. Until 1851 he entertained kindly feelings towards the colonists, when he made claims to land which he declared had been the property ot his brother, Sagamore John, which the General Court finally attempted to settle by ordering twenty acres to be laid out for him to make use of. After the death of his mother, the Squaw Sachem, he became the chief of the Pawtuckets and the nominal head of the Nipmucks, who occupied lands towards the Connecti- icut River. He joined King Philip in the war of 1675 and 1676, and, when taken prisoner, was sent a slave to Barbadoes. Finally released, he returned to Massachusetts, and died the last Pawtucket sachem, in 1684.

Notwithstanding the near presence of the natives, the people of Charlestown began at a very early period to push out into the adjacent country, and within and without the borders of that town to settle wherever they could find land suited to their needs. New colonists were constantly arriving from England,

159

MALDEN.

and during the first ten years after the arrival of Winthrop it is estimated that four thousand families had reached the shores of New England, including more than twenty-one thousand persons. They had come from a country where the ownership of land was a prize which only the wealthy were able to se- cure, and the almost limitless bounds of the western world attracted a continued wave of emigration, with liberal homesteads and farms, almost free of cost, as the expected rewards of their enterprise. The eager- ness displayed in our own day by the settlers of Okla- homa and other newly-opened Territories to possess advantageous sites for homes, finds a parallel in the days of our fathers, when almost for the asking the poor English laborer, with only sufficient means to secure a passage across the Atlantic, could become the lord of lands on a footing, so far as ownership was concerned, with the more favored in his English home.

Soon after the settlement of Charlestown a move- ment was made to establish a church. The Massa- chusetts Colony had instructed the three ministers, Messrs. Ffigginson, Skelton and Bright, who were among the members, that in case they could not agree who should "inhabit at Massachusetts Bay," they should "make choice of one of the three by lot, and he on whom the lot should fall should go, with his family, to perform that work." Rev. Fraucis Bright was finally selected, and engaged for £20 for the expenses of his journey, his passage out and back and a salary of £20 per year. He was to receive also £10 for the purchase of books, and a dwelling-house and land, to be used by him and left to his successor in the ministry. If he remained seven years he was to receive one hundred acres of land for his own use. Mr. Bright, however, was not a thorough Puritan, and the increasing non-conformity of the colonists dis- inclined him to continue as their pastor, and in July, 1630, he returned to England. It was said of him ou his departure "that he began to hew stones in the mountains wherewith to build, but when he saw all sorts of stones would not suit in the building, as he supposed, he, not unlike Jonah, fled from the presence of the Lord and went down to Tarshish."

In 1629 Thomas Greaves, the agent of the Colony at Charlestown, sent to England the following descrip- tion of the country in the neighborhood of his place of settlement :

"This much I can affirme in generell, that I never came in a more goodly country in all my life, all things considered. If it hath not at any time been manured and husbanded, yet it is very beautiful in open lands mixed with goodly woods, and again open plaines, in some places five hundred acres, some places more, come less ; not much troublesome for to cleare, for the plongh to goe in, no place barren but on the tops of the hils ; the grasse and weeds grow up to a man's face in the lowland, and by fresh rivers abundance of grasse and large meadowes without any tree or shrubbe to binder the sith. I never saw, except in Hungaria, unto which I always paralell the countrie in all our most respects, for every thing that is heare eyther sowne or planted prospereth far better than iu old England. The increase of corne is here farre beyond expec- tation, as I have scene here by experience in barly, the which because

it is so much above youre conception, I will not mention. And cuttle do prospere very well, and those that are bredd here farre greater than those with you in England. Vines doe grow here plentifully laden with the biggest grapes that ever I saw, some I have seene foure inches about, so that I am bold to say of this countrie as it is commonly said in Ger- many of Hungaria, that for cattel, corde and wine it excelleth. We have many more hopeful commodities here in this country, the which time will teach to toske good use of. . lo the mean time we abound with such things which next under God doe make 118 subsist ; as fish fowl, deere, and sundrie sorts of fruits as musk-melleons, water-mel- leone, Indian pompeons, Indian peare, beanes, aod many other odde fruits that I cannot name. All which are made good and pleasant through this maine blessing of God, the healthfulnesse of the countrer, which far exceedeth all parte that ever I have beene in. It is observed that few or none doe here fal eicke, unless of the scurvey, that they bring from aboard the ship with theni, whereof I have cured some of my companic onely by labonr."

Such letters as this written to England-and there were many-served to excite the adventurous spirit of the age and enlarged the wave of immigration, which was already flowing with full tide on the New Eng- land shores. After the arrival of Winthrop, in 1630, the settlement at Charlestown rapidly grew and ex- tended its boundaries. Shawmutor Boston was soon settled.

"Some went without the neck of this town who travelled up into the main till they came to a place well watered, whither Sir Richard Salton- stall and Mr. Phillips, minister, went, with several others, and settled a plantation and called it Wattertowne. Others went on the other side of Charles River, and then travelled up into the country and likewise find- ing good waters, settled there with Mr. Ludlow and called the planta- tion Dorchester, whither went Mr. Maverick and Mr. Warham, who were their ministers.

" In the meantime Mr. Blackstone, dwelling on the other side of Charles River alone at a place by the Indians called Shawmntt, where he only had a cottage at or not far off the place called Blackstone's Point, he came and acquainted the Governor of an excellent spring there without inviting him thither. Wherenpon after the death of Mr. John- son aud divers others the Goveroor, with Mr. Wilson and the greatest part of the church, removed thither : whither also the frame of the Gov - ernor's honse in preparation at this town was (also to the discontent of some) carried when people began to build their houses against winter and the place was called Boston.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. III, Part 107

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1890 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co Number of Pages: 1278

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1890
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co
Number of Pages: 1278