USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Scituate > History of Scituate, Massachusetts, from its first settlement to 1831 > Part 15
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There is no part of Plymouth Colony so diversified with hills and vallies, rocky declivities and deep morasses as Scituate. It more nearly resembles the undulated surface of Worcester county, than any other part of these ancient territories.
The lines of the Town enclose about forty-five square miles. A survey of the outlines of the Town was accomplished, and a plan prepared by order of General Court in 1794, by Charles Turner, jr., Esq. That is in the Secretary's office.
A. D. 1830, another and more particular survey was ordered by the General Court, which is to be made, according to con- tract with the selectmen, by Mr J. G. Hales of Boston : it was not completed in 1830. The General Court extended the time for completing these surveys. Mr Hales is now (April 1831) performing the work. He is engaged to prepare a plan for the use of the State, and also to draft a Town map for engraving.
* Musquashcut pond and harbour named in this work, we conjecture to be a slight corruption of Mishquashtuck, " a place of red cedars or red shrubs." The red cedar grows in great abundance in that vicinity.
Hunovis extend- Porch.
148
HISTORY.
NATURAL HISTORY.
The early records of Scituate mention the Live Oak forests, particularly in the vicinity of Colman's hills : but whether this was a species of the oak not known here at present, or other- wise, we can by no means determine. The white oak, by name, is also mentioned nearly at the same time; from which we might conclude that the live oak was not the same tree. The black walnut was indigenous to some parts of the Town. The last of those noble forest trees was felled upon the east side of Walnut Tree hill, near the road, in 1820. Its trunk was more than three feet in diameter. We have no doubt that it was more than two centuries old. There is a frequent men- tion in our early records of Spruce swamps. The spruce has nearly disappeared. Two varieties of the walnut are now common. The oak appears in several varieties, as the red, black, yellow, and two species of the white. The button wood grows naturally in the south part of the Town. The beach is so abundant in the north-west section, that this part of the Town has been called " the beaches," and the beach woods, from the earliest times. The white pine is the most abundant in general, and of very rapid growth, of which there are two species, the soft, upland, or pumpkin pine, and the swamp pine, that somewhat resembles the yellow pine of the west, but of inferior value to that. The white maple is rapid in its growth, and furnishes abundant fuel. The black, white, and yellow birch, and the black and white ash, and the hornbeam and elm are common. Extensive swamps of white cedar are in the westerly section of the Town, and the red cedar common to every part, but more abundant at the glades than elsewhere. That beautiful ever-green, the holly, is common to most of our woodlands-and the elegant flowering shrub, the mountain laurel, may be seen at Mount Blue, and in many other parts of the Town. It is a common and just remark, that there is and has been a rotation of forest trees, viz. when a pine forest has been felled the oak has sprung up, and when the oak has been felled it has been succeeded by the pine : as also the cedar and the maple forests have been rotatory in like manner.
As to the quantity of fuel, it is believed that it has scarcely diminished in the last half century. The ancient forests of oak have been converted to ships, but they have been followed by the more thrifty pine, so that there is no scarcity of fuel. The
149
MINERALOGY.
prices of fuel per cord vary from two to four dollars; according to the quality.
These forests abounded, in early times, with the animals common to New England. The bear was not uncommon in 1700, and perhaps later : but seems to have been a much more harmless animal than the wolf. For nearly a century the Town voted a yearly bounty for the destruction of the wolf: and in 1673, they divided out the swamps and required each man to clear a given number of acres, in order to break up the dens of the wolf. Wild cats were so common, and so destructive to the sheep, that a bounty on these also was long continued. Wolf Trap and Wild Cat are well known places to this day. Deer were preserved by a law of the Colony, and this Town kept up its committee "to prosecute that law," until 1780, or later. The racoon is not uncommon in our forests now, and often plunders the corn fields in autumn. The fox still makes his burrows, and several are taken yearly.
The marshes are visited in autumn with countless varieties of birds of passage, and the river and coast with fowls of all kinds that have been here known : but they are gradually diminishing, and hardly now repay the toil of the fowler. The black bird that was so abundant a century ago as to sweep off whole cornfields occasionally, is now rarely seen.
MINERALOGY.
The rocks are all primitive granite or sienite, generally approaching to the globular form, and rarely appearing in large masses or quarries. At the glades they appear in considerable masses, and are broken into irregular fissures : but no regular layers, and no secondary rocks are seen. The soil in general is composed of the silex and argilla, in a mixture very favorable to vegetation. As a general remark, we may observe that in the northern section, the mixture is more uniform, and in the southern section silicious hills and plains and argillaceous vallies are more distinctly marked.
The beds of clay from which bricks have been manufactured we have noticed under another head.
Iron ore is found in several parts of the Town, but in no great quantities. Some has been dug for use within the last twenty years, at Spring-brook meadow, by Mr James Torrey ... Some specimens of quartz in regular crystals have been found in the neighborhood of Wild Cat hill.
150
CHANGES.
PHYSICAL CHANGES.
The cliffs have gradually wasted by the attrition of the tides and storms. Comparing the third cliff with the number of acres of planting land originally laid out, we find that it is reduced nearly one half in two centuries. The fourth cliff wastes from twelve to sixteen inches per annum. A large rock in front of the fourth cliff that now lies at low water mark, is remembered by many, to have been at the top of the cliff, two hundred feet above its present bed, and several feet within the edge of the precipice, half a century since. The other cliffs probably waste in the same proportion. The beach between the third and fourth cliff, is composed of sand and pebbles, and resists the attrition of the tides more than the cliffs : yet it is slowly wasting, and the river probably will eventually find its outlet between those cliffs.
The great earthquake on the 18th of November 1755, is well remembered by many of our aged people. They describe the violent agitation of the earth as continuing about fifteen minutes ; in which time the walls were all thrown down, the tops of chimneys broken off, and in many instances the whole chimney stacks shaken down into the rooms, and many houses disjointed and nearly destroyed. The whole surface of the earth was seen to wave like the swellings of a sea, and occa- sionally breaking into fissures. It happened at day dawn in the morning, and brought the people from their beds in dreadful consternation. The rumbling of the earth, and the crashing of the falling walls, &c. was like the loudest thunder, and the commotion and roaring of the sea is described as no less terrible by those who lived near its margin. Several water spouts bursted out in the Town; we can name particularly, one near the brook at Sweet swamp, on the border of Dea. Joseph Bailey's garden. It threw out a considerable quantity of reddish sand of a singular appearance, and the spring thus opened continues to run to the present time. Another fissure of considerable magnitude was made on the south side, of "great swamp," so called.
151
MANNERS.
MANNERS, CUSTOMS, &c.
Many of the fathers of Scituate were men of good education and easy fortune, who had left homes altogether enviable, save in the single circumstance of the abridgment of their religious liberty. In 1639, this Town contained more men of distin- guished talents, and fair fortune, than it has contained at any period since. They were "the men of Kent," celebrated in English history as men of gallantry, loyalty and courtly manners. Gilson, Vassall, Hatherly, Cudworth, Tilden, Hoar, Foster, Stedman, Saffin, Hinckley and others had been accustomed to the elegances of life in England. It was a natural and una- voidable consequence, that in this wilderness, a less polished race should succeed; and yet many of these fathers survived the darkest period of the Colony, and gave a lasting impression of their manners upon posterity.
Slavery was practised to a considerable extent; but they had no occasion to import servants of this description, for they won them "with their sword and their bow." The wills of the first generation often make provision for Indian servants, but rarely mention an African slave. We have seen but one in- stance of this kind previous to 1690. . Subsequently to 1700, African slaves had pretty generally been purchased by the wealthy families : and the posterity of that race is now more numerous in this Town, than in any other town of the ancient Colony.
It was a superstitious age when this country was first settled, and we are not to suppose that the fathers of Scituate were wholly exempt from the weakness of that age; and it is not improbable that the dangers of the wilderness may have con- tributed something towards nourishing those superstitions.
It is not an unpleasing subject of reflection to the descendants of the fathers of Plymouth Colony, that religious intolerance and her twin sister superstition, never were suffered to reign so absolutely here as in some other Colonies.
WITCHCRAFT.
The first indictment for witchcraft in New England, was at Hartford, Connecticut, in 1647, when the first execution also took place for that offence, " against God and the King." The only indictments in Plymouth Colony for witchcraft were
152
WITCHCRAFT.
against two persons of Scituate, which we have extracted from the Colony records.
A. D. 1660, " William Holmes' wife was accused for beinge a witch. Dinah Sylvester accuser and witness sworne, said she saw a beare about a stone's throw from the path *
(blank in the records.) *
But being examined and asked what manner of tayle the beare had, she said she could not tell, for his head was towards her." The accused was discharged. It is natural to conjecture, in looking at the manner in which this trial is entered on the original records, that the testimony was too ridiculous to be recorded in full. The bear was doubtless alleged by the witness to have been William Holmes's wife in that shape. The good sense of the Governor and assistants trinmphed over superstition in a fortunate time, to check accusations of this kind. In looking at the records of the next Court, we were happy to observe that "Dinah Sylvester was summoned before the Court, and sentenced to be whipt, or to make publicke acknowledgment (paying the costs of prosecution) for false accusation against William Holmes' wife." She chose the latter, and her acknowledgment of "maliciously accusing the woman," was entered on the public records in 1661.
The other indictment was against Mary Ingham, March 1676, as follows :
"Mary Ingham, thou art indicted by the name of Mary Ingham, the wife of Thomas Ingham of Scituate, for thou, not having the feare of God before thine eyes, hast, by the helpe of the Devil, in a way of witchcraft or sorcery, maliciously procured much hurt, mischieff and paine, unto the body of Mehitabel Woodworth, daughter of Walter Woodworth of Scituate, and to some others, particularly causing her to falle into violent fits, and causing her great paine unto several partes of her body at several tymes, so that the said Mehitabel hath been almost bereaved of her senses ; and hath greatly languished to her much suffering thereby, and procuring of greate grieffe sorrow and charge to her parents : all which thou hast procured and done, against the law of God, and to his greate dishonor, and contrary to our Sovereign Lord the King, his crown and dignity."
She was tried by a jury of twelve men- "Verdict, not guilty." It was natural at that superstitious day, that a person affected with nervous insanity, should look round for some one on whom to charge those sufferings. Ingham's wife was aged,
153
LIST OF FREEMEN.
and probably lived in retirement, conversing little with this world, and hence was suspected to hold converse with invisible beings. Thus, however, ended indictments for witchcraft in this Colony : happy would it have been, had good sense else- where as soon triumphed over superstition .* There is, how- ever, some apology for the governments of Connecticut and Massachusetts, viz. that witchcraft was believed in and punished in England at the time that moral disease broke forth in this country. Even the great Sir Matthew Hale had- prescribed rules for detecting witches.
The belief in the reality of witchcraft has long since been abandoned, and few persons, within the last half century, have spoken of witchcraft or ghosts or haunted houses, except as a superstition which was unworthy of their own times. The last haunted house here was that of Lathrop Litchfield, in the part of the Town called the Beach woods, nearly forty years since. A knocking was heard in a closet and repeated almost daily for many months : and though several gentlemen of a good share of philosophy endeavored to investigate the cause, it could never be satisfactorily explained : it ought however to be stated, that no gentleman of the above description was found to allow that there was any supernatural cause. Dr. Barnes was invited to try his skill in the investigation, but unfortunately the ghost would not knock while the Doctor was there.
A LIST OF THE FREEMEN FROM 1633 TO 1649.
William Gilson 1633.
Isaac Robinson
Anthony Annable
Mr James Cudworth 1634.
Humphry Turner
Samuel Fuller
William Hatch
John Cooper
Henry Cobb Samuel House
Henry Rowley
Mr Timothy Hatherly 1635.
* In the Massachusetts Colony records, we observe that the first indict- ment for witchcraft was in 1648. "Court Order. This Court (being desirons that the same course which hath been taken in England for the discovery of witches by watching, may also be taken here with the witch now in question), do order that a strict watch be set about her every night, and that her hus- band be confined to a private roome and watched also."
The accused was Margaret Jacob (alias Jones): Winthrop describes her confinement, and gives some details of the evidence. The persons who were appointed spies, alleged that " they saw a little child coming in and going out from her repeatedly, and when they pursued the child, it vanished."
On such testimony, the poor woman was condemned and executed.
20
154
LIST OF FREEMEN.
George Kenrick
1
John Williams
Edward Foster
1636.
George Lewis Bernard Lombard
Mr Thomas Dimmack John Twisden Thomas Chambers John Hews (the Welshman)
Mr John Lothrop 1637.
Henry Bourne
Mr Charles Chauncy 1640. William Parker
Samuel Hinckley John Lewis
Edmund Edenden 1641.
Richard Sealis
1638.
Thomas Clapp 1645.
Edward Fitzrandle
Edward Jenkins 1647.
William Casely
1639.
Isaac Stedman 1648.
Robert Linnet
John Allen 1649.
A list of those who took "the oath of fidelity" from 1633 to 1668. Many of them were church members, but they declined taking "the freeman's oath" at first, which, however, most of them eventually did.
Nathaniel Tilden
Thomas Bird
Daniel Standlake
Hercules Hills
Mr William Vassall Henry Ewell William Crocker Robert Shelley John Crocker
Lieut. James Torrey
(Richard) Beaumont
Joseph Wermall James Cushman
Joseph Colman
Thomas Weyborne
Nicholas Wade George Willard Thomas Hyland
Mr Thomas King John Vassall
John Turner, sen,
Thomas Pincin Thomas Prior Isaac Welles
Resolved White
George Russell
Stephen Vinall John Vinall Abraham Prebble
William Holmes, sen. Henry Merritt Thomas Chittenden William Perry Robert Stetson Joseph Checkett John Stockbridge Edward Casely Samuel Jackson William Wills
Rhodolphus Ellmes Thomas Lapham Henry Mason Jeremiah Hatch Lieut. Isaac Buck Walter Briggs Gilbert Brooks William Curtis
-
George Moore Joseph Tilden Serj. John Bryant
Mr Thomas Besbedge
Walter Woodworth
155
LIST OF FREEMEN.
Richard Curtis Humphry Johnson John Hallet William Barstow William Brooks Walter Hatch
Jonas Pickels Samuel Utley Thomas Ingham
John Durand
John Whitcomb Robert Whitcomb
William Peakes
Abraham Sutliffe
John Whiston
John Winter
Christopher Winter
Matthew Gannett
John Cowen John Otis 1662.
Michael Pierce
John Cushing
William Randall
Charles Stockbridge 1668.
Israel Cudworth
Experience Litchfield
John James
John Palmer, jr.
Edward Wanton
Thomas Palmer
William Ticknor
Elnathan Palmer
William Blackmore
John Turner, jr. Thomas Oldham
Anthony Collamore
William Hatch, jr. (son of)
Nathaniel Rawlins
Thomas Hatch
George Pidcoke
Anthony Dodson
Daniel Hickes John Magoon
Richard Dagan
John Booth
In the above list, the present inhabitants of the Town will see the names that most commonly prevail at the present date. Some of them removed early, and left no descendants in this Town, as the reader will find noticed in the sequel of this work.
A list of "allowed and approved inhabitants," to whom portions of the common lands were assigned, by the joint com- mittee of the Court and the Town in 1673.
Ensign John Allen Mr Nicholas Baker
Lieut. Isaac Buck John Bryant, sen. Walter Briggs Joseph Barstow William Brooks John Booth William Blackmore
John Buck, sen. John Bumpus Widow Bird
John Bryant, jr.
John Bailey James Briggs
Isaac Buck
John Buck, jr.
John Briggs
John Hanmer Ephraim Kempton John Sutton Peter Collamore
Stephen Tilden Nathaniel Tilden John Palmer
156
LIST OF FREEMEN.
Isaac Chittenden Peter Collamore Richard Curtis Thomas Clap
Thomas Chittenden's heirs John Cushing
Major Cudworth Nathaniel Church William Curtis
John Curtis John Cowen
Matthew Gannett
Samuel Jackson
George Russell
Edward Right
Thomas Pincin, sen.
Thomas Pincin, jr.
Cor. Robert Stetson
Moses Simons
Joseph Sylvester
Benjamin Stetson
Robert Sprout
John Magoon
Joseph Stetson
Abraham Sutliffe
Thomas Stetson
Charles Stockbridge
Richard Standlake
Samuel Stetson
Thomas Perry
Thomas Palmer John Palmer, sen.
John Palmer, jr.
John Turner, sen.
John Turner, jr.
Humphry Turner's heirs
Daniel Turner
Thomas Turner
Nathaniel Turner
William Hatch Thomas Hatch
Thomas Ingham
Edward Jenkins
William James Thomas King, sen.
Thomas King, jr. Josiah Litchfield Henry Joslin John Merritt
John Hews' heirs
Thomas Lapham
Thomas Nichols
Thomas Oldham
William Peakes
Michael Pierce
Anthony Collamore Samuel Clap
Jonathan Cudworth
Joseph Colman, sen.
James Cudworth, jr. Israel Cudworth
Zechariah Colman
Thomas Colman
Henry Chittenden Richard Dwelly
James Doughty
Anthony Dodson
John Daman, sen.
John Daman, jr. Rhodolphus Ellmes
Henry Ewell John Ensign
Widow Ensign
Widow Garrett John Hanmer, sen.
John Hanmer, jr.
Thomas Hiland, sen.
Thomas Hiland, jr. Samuel House
Walter Hatch Jeremiah Hatch
Daniel Hickes
Stephen Tilden James Torrey
Widow Torrey
Nathaniel Tilden
Widow Tilden (of Joseph)
William Ticknor
157
CENSUS.
Jonathan Turner Nathaniel Man John Stetson Stephen Vinall Mr William Witherell. John Vinall
Thomas Woodworth
Samuel Witherell Theophilus Witherell William Wilcome
Nicholas Wade
Robert Whitcomb John Hallet Joseph White
Timothy White Jonathan Jackson John Witherell
William Parker
Widow Young
Several others had a privilege of the commons for wood and pasture, but not in further division of land, because they had removed and still retained their farms, or because they had recently arrived. For example.
John Saffin's house. He was in Massachusetts 1673.
John Stockbridge. He had removed to Boston 1647.
Serj. William Ticknor. He was not a householder 1647.
John Rance. He was a travelling Quaker.
John Nollman. He had recently come into the plantation.
Israel Hobart. His family then in Hingham.
Henry Joslin. Recently come from Black Point.
Edward Wanton. Not a householder in 1647.
John Otis. Had temporarily removed to Barnstable.
Timothy Foster. He resided mostly in Dorchester.
James Davis. Recently arrived in Town.
Benjamin Chandler, as above.
Israel Sylvester. Had a house in Marshfield also.
Nicolas Albeson, (the Sweede, uncertain wherefore).
UNITED STATES CENSUS.
In 1790, (65 of color),
2862 souls.
1800,
2728.
No. of houses
420.
1810,
2969.
1820,
3235.
1830, (60 of color), 3512.
We state the census taken in 1830, viz. 3512, according to the list of Mr Berry the agent.
It having been suspected that the census was taken hastily and imperfectly, the Town voted in November 1830, that the school agents in each district should be requested to make a
158 1
LAND MARKS.
return as soon as might be, of the census in their respective districts. By that return the population amounts to 3573. This includes about sixty people of color.
ANCIENT LAND MARKS.
It may be useful to describe some of the land marks noticed in the early laying out of lands.
Asp hill, (or Mast hill), in the beach woods near Johnson's swamp.
Belle house neck, near Little's bridge, now Cushing neck.
Bound brook, falls into the gulph at Lincoln's mills.
Bound rock, the land mark of the patent line near Lincoln's mills.
Bound brook neck, north-east of Lincoln's mills.
Black swamp, on Bound brook above the mills.
Buck's rock, near the gulph meadows.
Booth's hill, near junction of the roads one mile south Lincoln's mills.
Brushy hill, three fourths mile south-east from the north Meeting-house.
Briggs's harbour, within the glades (or Strawberry cove).
Bumpas's bridge, over north branch of second Herring brook, above Dead swamp.
Burnt Plain, one mile north west of Hoop-pole hill and south- west of Mount Blue.
Bryant's bridge, over the second Herring brook.
Brook hall field, north side of Belle house neck.
Buck's corner, south-east old parsonage, (see Isaac Buck).
Barstow's hill, on the Plymouth road at Snappet Meeting-house. Black pond and hill, one and an half mile west of Town-house. Block-house, on North river half mile above Union bridge.
Barstow's bridge in 1650 and later, now North river bridge. Blue bridge and island, between Hoop-pole Hill and burnt plain. Beaver dams, on Satuit brook-on first Herring brook at the ancient fulling mill-on second Herring brook at the south of Dead swamp-on third Herring brook below old pond -also at Valley swamp above Jacob's mills - also a half mile west of Nathaniel Brooks's.
Cedar point, north of the harbour at the Light-house.
Crow point, on the south of the harbour.
Clay pits, in 1650, half mile east of "the stepping stones."
159
LAND MARKS.
Cold spring swamp, 1650, on Merritt's brook.
Cleft rock, back of John Pierce's, north of Conihassett burying ground.
Castle rock, the point at the gulph mill.
Cushing hill, (rather modern), half mile east of Jacob's mill.
Country road, in 1646, leading to Cohasset, in 1670, the Plymouth road.
Cordwood hill, one mile south-west of the south Meeting-house. Clay pit cart way, south-west of Cordwood hill, and earlier south-east of old Church hill.
Cornet's rocks, in the North river opposite the Two mile mills. Cornet's mill, 1656, at the Indian path below old pond, (Major Winslow's).
Chamberlain plain, north east of Beaver dam or Dead swamp. Candlewood plain, between Hanover Meeting-house and Drink- water.
Cricket hole in 1640, west of Jonah's mill (now called) or Buttonwood swamp.
Cedar swamp cart way, 1660, from Booth hill to Merritt's brook. Capt. Jacob's cart way 1720, over Beaver dam at Valley swamp. Drinkwater, on the west branch of Indian head river, south of Hanover.
Daman's Island, 1649, in the gulph marshes.
Eagle's nest swamp, the great swamp south-east of Beach woods. Flat swamp, between Mount Blue and Mount Ararat.
Fox hill, one mile south-west of Wild cat hill.
Farm neck, or Great neck, north of the harbour to the glades. Fane Island, 1646, in the marshes at Farm neck.
Great swamp, (see Eagle's nest).
Gillman plain, on Plymouth road south of Valley swamp.
Greenfield, in 1633, &c. south half mile of second cliff.
Gravelly beach, on North river, east side, two miles above Union bridge.
Gray's hill, half mile south of Cordwood hill.
Great neck, (see Farm neck).
George Moore's swamp and bridge, south branch of first Herring brook.
Groundsell brook, falls into Bound brook west of Mount Hope. Groundsell hill, east part of Belle house neck, also east of Joshua Bryant's.
Gulph Island, at the mouth of first Herring brook.
Dead swamp, on second Herring brook, one mile from its mouth.
Dry Cedar swamp, on Merritt's brook, near ancient Studly place.
-
160
LAND MARKS.
Hanmer's hook, west of Hanover Meeting-house.
Hugh's cross and brook, south branch, third Herring brook at Curtis's mill.
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