History of Norfolk County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 132

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1534

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the ordinances of the Lord Jesus may be there dispensed and duly attended, that his blessing may be upon us and presence with us, remembering that he have promised that where his name is recorded there he will come and there he will bless his people; and whereas we have already enjoyed encouraging tast of that measure of fitness that God hath bestowed upon your- self to dispense his mind to us in the public ministry of his word, we therefore do jointly declare with one consent we desire you to accept of these few lines as a solemn and unanimous desire and invitation to that work of the ministry of the gospel to us and among us at that place, hoping that though our beginning be small yet our latter end shall much increase; and that know- ing that until the house and ordenances of the Lord Jesus be carefully provided for, few, if any, serious godly people, they that we desire to encourage, will be willing to settle themselves there with us, we so much the more earnestly desire you would not refuse our request and wish, and doubt not but that the Lord of his goodness will make us in some measure able and willing to attend the rule of Christ for your due encouragement in all outward supplies ; and if you please to accept of this our invi- tation and earnest desire, we do engage ourselves to be careful not to neglect our duties therein, and such of us as are Inhabit- ants shall also attend the same according to our proportion in our estates there at such time as we shall reside and dwell there; but wheresoever we, the late proprietors, dwell, we shall be ready and willing to bear charge thereunto according to our late (vote)."

This letter is dated 27th Tenth month, 1669, and was subscribed by thirty-nine names. It was indorsed as follows :

" We whose names are hereunder written declare our appro- bation of the within invitation, and desire that a blessing from the father of Merceys may be upon it and the work intended.

" ELEA. LUSHER, " JOHN ALLIN, " JOHN HUNTING."

Eleazer Lusher, whose name is frequently mentioned in connection with town and proprietary affairs, was a prominent man in the Colony of Massachusetts Bay. In Dedham he was concerned in all important matters, which of course included Wollomonopoag. Hence the invitation to Mr. Man must have his approval. It is said he came to Dedham with Mr. Allin, and was more learned than any other man in town, except- ing Mr. Allin. He kept the records, and it is to his care that we are indebted for the facts that have been preserved regarding the settlement here. He was frequently a deputy to the General Court, of which body he was a useful and influential member. He participated in all the momentous affairs of the col- ony whenever there was occasion for the counsel and services of the wisest and most patriotic.

In April, 1670, the proprietors appointed John Thurston and Samuel Sheeres to be fence-viewers at Wollomonopoag ; attended to some complaints against some land-takers outside of the six hundred acres, and voted a dividend of lowlands, fit to be improved for English grass, half an acre to each cow-common, if so much may be found, otherwise less.

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HISTORY OF NORFOLK COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

At a general meeting of the proprietors held on the 1st of the Second month, 1671, " the question being put, who are the persons that will engage (God willing) that themselves and their families shall be settled at the place called Wollomonopoage, before the end of the fourth month, called June, Anno 1671, persons answering were John Thurston, Thomas Thurston, Robert Ware, John Ware, Joseph Cheeney. It was thereupon voted, that the proprietors desire that these men and John Aldis should settle them- selves and their families." They also confirmed the bounds of the plantation as established in 1661, and ordered a book " for the entering such acts as concern Wollomonopoag, and such transcripts as may be made from Dedham town book, and contributed three shil- lings, sixpence for the purchase, and appointed Eleazer Lusher to make the entries and transcripts and paid him three shillings eightpence in part satisfaction."

It will be noticed that June is called the fourth month. At that time the year commenced on the twenty-fifth day of March throughout his majesty's dominions. In the twenty-fourth year of the reign of George II. (1751), Parliament enacted that the year should begin (after Dec. 31, 1751) on the first day of January next following.

It seems, then, that six persons with their families were to be settled at Wollomonopoag before the end of June, 1671. These, with Samuel Sheeres' family, would make seven families that were probably dwell- ing here in the wilderness, before the close of 1671.

In January, 1672, a grant for a corn-mill was made. The mill was to be built "upon that stream that comes out of the ponde and runns into Charles River, in the neerest convenient place to the lower ende of the ponde in Wollomonopoag, and made fitte for work, and doe grinde corn as such a mill ought to doe before the first daye of Maye, which shall be Anno 1673, and be so kept and attended that the Inhabi- tants there be supplyed with good meale from time to time of the corne they shall bring to mille." To the builder the whole power of the stream was granted, and he was also to have a house-lot out of any unappropriated land not exceeding ten or twelve acres.

This action was some ten years after the first steps taken by Dedham about the plantation, and tends strongly to show that the first comers were only tem- porary dwellers, looking after their improvements and returning home when their tasks were done.

lishment of a blacksmith,-hardly less important,- and an able and faithful minister was invited.

A committee, of which Maj. Lusher was a member, entered into a contract with Robert Crossman to build a mill on the conditions above stated. Robert en- gaged for himself and his heirs to build and equip the mill, " God permitting," according to the proposi- tions of the proprietors, whereunto he did subscribe by making his mark.

This was the last service rendered the settlement by Maj. Lusher. His death occurred this year, and in January following a committee was appointed to " recon with Mrs. Lusher. for the writing written in the booke by the Hon'd. Major Lusher."

The mill, it seems, made slow progress; for in 1674, Crossman requesting that the land he was to have might be laid out to him, was answered that when he should finish the mill according to his en- gagement, he should have it laid out by Sergt. Thomas Thurston and others. And in 1680 it was voted that " if Robert Crossman do not speedily put his mill in good repair the inhabitants ' will see out for the pro- curing another mill.'"

There is a tradition that a son of Crossman was killed below the mill by an Indian, by which the father was so alarmed and discouraged that he aban- doned his mill and let it go out of repair. The rec- ord of the son's death is as follows: "Nathaniel Crossman, the son of Robert Crossman and Sarah, his wife, was killed by the Enymy Indians, March ye 8, 1675-6."

Anticipating a few years, it appears that in 1685 the grants formerly made to Crossman were con- ferred upon John Whiting upon similar terms. He was the son of Nathaniel, who had a corn-mill on Mother Brook, in Dedham, and who drew lot number two in the six-hundred acres dividend " not far from the place intended to build a mill at." He did not come to Wollomonopoag. But he must have been the owner of Crossman's rights in the mill, as his widow, Hannah Whiting, conveyed them by her deed to this son John, with other property, describing it as coming to her from her deceased husband, Nathaniel. This deed was dated Nov. 9, 1688, in the fourth year of King James II. John married Dec. 24, 1688, and lived upon the land granted to Crossman, near the outlet of the Great, or Mill Pond.

In the year 1821 the town of Wrentham investi- gated the question whether the successors of John Whiting, viz., the Eagle Manufacturing Company, were not bound to grind corn, etc., for the inhabitants according to the conditions of the ancient grant to

This time the settlement began in earnest. The Thurstons, Wares, and others agreed to go up and settle at Wollomonopoag, with their families; the building of a corn mill was provided for, the estab- | Crossman. It appears in the course of this investi-

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gation, from the depositions of Capt. Lewis Whiting, Joseph Whiting, and Jemima Fisher, grandchildren of John Whiting, " that their grandfather built the mill on the present dam on the grant made to Cross- man to grind particularly for the inhabitants of Wrentham." And it further appeared that the dwell- ing-house built and owned by their grandfather, John Whiting, now (1821) owned by Eliphalet Whiting, stands on the two-acre lot granted by the proprietors to their grandfather, John. (Two acres were granted John when he succeeded to Crossman in 1685.) It further appeared that the original site of the corn-mill was some eighty rods above the present dam, one of the deponents saying he had dug out mortised timber there, and seen the remains of a dam, and that such remains were believed to be visible even then (1821). The deponents had been told, and always understood that their grandfather, John, was the son of Nathan- iel, of Dedham, and that before he was married, when he was about eighteen years old, he came up from Dedham, and " tended the mill ;" and that his mother came with him and purchased all the lands, buildings, and rights of Crossman. These deponents were more than eighty years of age, and must have known their grandfather, John, who died in 1755. That house, the dwelling-house of that John Whiting, some por- tions of which were erected nearly two hundred years ago, and which were standing in 1821, is still standing, probably the oldest building within the bounds of the plantation, and still in the possession of descendants of John Whiting. It is doubted if a parallel case can be found in the ancient Wollomonopoag.

As to the obligation of the factory owners to grind for the inhabitants, such eminent counselors as Wil- liam Prescott and Solicitor-General Davis united in the opinion that the owners were under that obliga- tion, and that suits might be maintained against them. But here the matter was dropped. Besides the grain-mill, there were formerly a fulling-mill and a saw-mill where the dam now stands.

The precise time when the first minister, the Rev. Samuel Man, came to abide at Wollomonopoag is not known. The people had, as appears from their letter, heard him preach probably at Dedham, and probably between the date of that letter (1669 and 1672) he preached to the little group of settlers in this wilder- ness occasionally, if not regularly.1 However this | may have been, in 1672 the proprietors voted that " a rate should be made of 1s. 6d. per cow-common towards the maintenance of the present minister at

Wollomonopoag." And the "inhabitants moved there might be a committee chosen to treat with Mr. Samuel Man in reference to his settling and carrying on the worke of the ministrie ther."

After this preliminary step in the most important matter of settling a minister, they began to care for the highways and to procure a blacksmith, next to the miller a man of the greatest importance in the infant settlement.

They, the proprietors, voted to give ten acres of upland for the encouragement of " such a man as may be approved of the calling of a blacksmyth." This was in 1672. But they did not then succeed, for in 1674 they voted " for further incoragement of a black- smith in case there appere a man that is suffichant workeman and other wayse Incorageabell and do sup- ply the towne with Good and suffichant ware, too acres of meaddow and 2 or 3 acres of low swampy land, on condition that he inhabitt in the towne 7 years, but if he remove from the town within 10 years the too acres of meadow to returne to the towne againe." And in 1675 a small parcel of meadow containing two acres, lying below " Slate Rock," was left for a smith. This was granted to James Mosman upon the condition of the vote of 1674. The infer- ence is that Mosman was the first blacksmith in the place. But he did not remain here long, and in 1685 it was voted that " considering the want of a black- smith Sergt. Fisher is requested to treat with Samll. Dearing respecting the same and make report to the town." Two years later the town invited Samuel Dearing " to settle with us to folow the calling of a blacksmith." In 1687 the town, for his encourage- ment to settle, granted him "liberty of wood for firing and for coal for his worke and feeding and tim- ber for his use upon the comon land so long as he continue in the calling of a blacksmith in the town ; this and what was proposed to him att our meeting last year." On the 23d of June, 1688, the inhabit- ants being at work in the highway, Samuel Dearing also being present, agreed to accept the land assigned for a blacksmith upon the terms stated at the meeting in 1672, and the inhabitants agreed " to confirm said land, and also yt parcel of meadow and swampy land which was assigned for the encourgement of a smith, to the said Saml. Dearing ; and do also appoint a committee to lay out the house-lot of ten acres near the Meeting- House." The committee " did forthwith lay out said ten acres abutting upon the highway in part southwest and near to the land for the Burying place Northeast and common land on all other parts." Other grants and promises of land were also made to him. He decided to locate here. In 1708 he was married to

1 As he died in 1719, and this was the forty-ninth year of his ministry, as Mr. Bean was informed, he must have commenced about the year 1671.

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HISTORY OF NORFOLK COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

Mary Man, the daughter and oldest child of the Rev. Samuel Man. Mr. Dearing was one of the selectmen in 1706. He died in 1753, at the good old age of ninety-six. The grant of ten acres made to him in- cludes the land where the present Congregational and Episcopal houses of worship stand.

In 1672 a committee, previously appointed, re- ported to the proprietors as follows, substantially : " Imprimis, to grant Mr. Man a convenient house- lot out of the public lands, so much as shall arise upon ten cow-commons, and all rights and privileges thereto belonging, as also libertie to choose half his proportion of meadow, the rest to take as other men." Further, the proprietors tender fifty pounds towards building him a house, and the inhabitants engage to pay as they have intimated. This on condition that he settle at Wollomonopoag; but " if he is called to move, then he shall choose two or three men who shall judge and determine what shall be presented to them, and if they agree that his call is clear to re- move through default of the people, then Mr. Man shall enjoy the house and all the lands formerly men- tioned ; but if they do not so judge, and yet Mr. Man remove, then the former grants to return to the pro- prietors." To these terms Mr. Man agreed as fol- lows: " I do accept of these propositions in case they be performed within the space of a year and a half. (Signed) Samuel Man."

A committee was at the same time chosen to col- lect the money and build the house.

Such was Mr. Man's settlement. The prospect was not cheerful. His call had been pending some three years. He knew, for he had preached among them, that this small company of farmers could barely maintain themselves and their families. He came into almost a wilderness, where there was not only no meeting-house to receive him, but even no dwelling- house for a shelter and home, and, as Mr. Bean says in his century sermon, only sixteen families.

He was the only son of William Man, who came from Kent County, England, where he was born about the year 1607. He married Mary Jarrard, and set- tled in Cambridge, Mass. His son Samuel was born there July 6, 1647. He was graduated at Harvard University in 1665 ; married Esther Ware, of Ded- ham, in 1673; was employed as a teacher at Dedham, Mass. ; ordained at Wrentham April 13, 1692, and died there May 22, 1719, in the seventy-second year of his age and forty-ninth of his ministry. His chil- dren were eleven in number, seven sons and four daughters, and, while his descendants must be very numerous, not one is known to bear the name at present in the town.

Incorporation of Wrentham .- In October, 1673, the inhabitants addressed the following petition to the General Court :

" The petition of the Inhabitants of Wollomonopoage humbly showeth that whereas it hath pleased God by his especial provi- dence to set the place of the habitation of divers of us in a place within the bounds of Dedham where some of us have lived severall years conflicting with the difficulties of a wilderness state, and being a long time without any to dispense the word of God to us, although at last it hath pleased God to send the gospel among us, dispensed by that faithful servant of his, Mr. Samuel Man; but not having power to assess or gather what have been engaged by reason divers live not within the limits of the town, and the constables of Dedham are not willing to gather what has been engaged, neyther is that engaged by Town power, so the pay is not attained, but that work is like to fail and we perish for lack of knowledge unless it please God to move your hearts who are the fathers of the country to take care for us and not for us only but for the interest of God here, now being helpless and hopeless doe yet venture to spread our complaint before your honors desiring you would put forth your power to promote the ordinances of God here. That which we desire and humbly present to your pious considera- tion is that there may be a committee impowered by this Hon. Court to settle some way for the maintenance of the ministrie, which we doubt not but most of the proprietors in Dedham and elsewhere will readily grant, yet some there are that have rights here seem only to be willing that we should labor under the straights of a new plantation so as to bring their land to a great price, which no other can regulate (that we understand) but yourselves. Therefore we fly to your wisdom and justice for help which no other under God can do. The proprietors also having engaged but for so long as we remain under the town power of Dedham, and Dedham now advising us to in- deavor to be of ourselves declaring that they cannot act for us as is necessary in divers cases they living so remote. And if it shall please God so far to move you to help us in this dis- tressed state we humbly further crave to be excused from pay- ing any County rates for 7 or 8 years, we being few and poor and far into the country, and not considerable to the County which will oblige us to serve your honors. We have herewith sent the copies of what the proprietors did engage (which have caused us your petitioners to venture upon these difficulties expecting more would have come to us) which we desire may be ratified till they send inhabitants suitable, or what other way God may direct your wisdom to determine, which shall ever oblige your poor supplyants to pray, &c."

The selectmen of Dedham assented, and upon the 17th day of October, 1673, O. S., the inhabitants were made a town by the name of Wrentham. The selectmen desire, " if the Court see meet to grant them town power, that it may be called Wrentham." Mr. Bean alludes to the tradition extant in 1773 that some of the first settlers here came from Old Wrentham, in England. It is supposed that the Rev. Mr. Philip or Phillips, who left his pulpit in Old Wrentham by reason of the persecutions of 1636-38, came to Ded- ham, and that he received an invitation to the minis- try in Dedham in 1638, but did not accept it. After being in Dedham and perhaps other places about a year he returned to his native land and resumed his

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pastoral duties in his former parish. It is said that upon his voyage hither he was attended by " a goodly company," others also from Old Wrentham, England, having preceded him. The names of Thurston and Paine are particularly mentioned. These brought "an account of the state of affairs in Wrentham on which the Christian people of Dedham in that coun- try invited him by letter to that plantation beforehand, so that when he arrived his friends there did expect and much endeavor to obtain his guidance in the first beginning of their ecclesiastical relationship."

In the petition of the inhabitants their leading thought seems to have been the maintenance of the minister. They asked for town power that rates might be made and collected for this purpose. " Spir- itual affairs were ever first in the minds of the Puri- tans." " It being as unnatural for a right New Eng- land man to live without an able ministry as for a smith to work his iron without a fire." And the Gen- eral Court "judgeth it meet to give the petitioners all due encouragement conduceable to their settle- ment with the present minister, according to their desires."

The minister was the principal person in town ; the real head of the people. His advice was sought in matters temporal as well as spiritual. Usually he was the only learned man in these primitive settlements. As the freemen must be church-members, it may be conceded that his influence must have been almost without limit.

The early comers to Massachusetts established a church after their own choice, and the civil polity was in subordination to the ecclesiastical.

In the resolve of Oct. 17, 1673, the General Court granted " all the liberties and privileges of a town- ship," with the boundaries heretofore agreed upon between the inhabitants and Dedham. Wrentham thus became independent of Dedham. But yet the inhabitants were not considered competent to manage their town affairs, and the Court placed them under the guardianship of a committee, " for the better car- rying in end of their prudential affairs," etc., and ap- pointed Capt. Hopestill Foster, Mr. William Park, and Ensign Daniel Fisher to be the committee. They were to be joined with any two of the inhabitants that might be chosen, and the acts of said committee or the major part of them were " to be valid, and their power to continue till the Court take further order." And Wrentham was exempted from county rates for four years.

John and Thomas Thurston were chosen by the inhabitants " to joyne with the committee appointed by the Court."

Organization of the Town .- We now leave our Indian cognomen of Wollomonopoag. Hereafter the name given by the General Court is to be our desig- nation. On the 4th day of December, 1673, the committee (for ordering the affairs of the town called Wrentham, near unto Dedham) met and ordered as followeth :

"1. Thomas Thurston to have the town book and make record of such orders as have passed respecting said plantation, etc.

"2. Property holders there shall pay 18. 6d. for every cow- common for support of the minister, according to a previous vote.

"3. £50 to be assessed upon the proprietors towards build- ing him a house, according to an act past by them ye 31 June, '72.

" 4. All former committees to continue the work committed to them heretofore, as to laying out highways, etc.

"5. That the order in Dedham Town Book referring to the admitting inhabitants, made June 1, '66, be transcribed in this town book, to be an order for the town of Wrentham as to all intents and purposes therein contained.

"Subscribed. Per order of Gen. Court.

" HOPESTILL FOSTER,

"WILLIAM PARK, " DANIEL FISHER, " JOHN THURSTON."

The important order referred to by the committee was in substance as follows :

" Whereas, towns have suffered from the entertainment of persons privately, and as this town is liable to like inconve- nience, therefore for the prevention thereof, it is ordered that no inhabitant of the town, or tenant of any house, lands, &c., shall after due publication hereof, grant, sell, alienate, lease, assign, sett, or to farme lett any house, lands or parcels of land whatsoever within said town &c., to any persons not formerly dwelling within our town, nor shall hire any out of town per- son for a servant by the yeare or any apprentice for more than two months without the leave of the Committee or the Select- men, without such 'securitie' for the 'town's indemnitie' as said Committee or Selectmen shall accept. Notice shall be given of all such contracts made or intended to some one of the Comttee or selectmen, and if not forbidden within a month then the party may proceed therein. But if being forbidden, he shall, notwithstanding proceed to contract or entertain contrary to this order, or shall fail to give notice as above provided, he shall for every month so continuing forfeit to the use of the Towne twenty shillings to be levied upon his goods by the constable by warrant from the Comttee or Selectmen or be recoverable by action at law."

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History of Norfolk County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 132

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1534

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) ed
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1534