History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 183

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1576

USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I > Part 183

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The early English explorers found on Leicester hill a luxuriant growth of strawberries, and therefore gave the place the name of Strawberry Hill, which it had hitherto retained. It now received the name of Leicester, and was assigned to Middlesex County. It was on the 23d day of the same mooth that the number of proprietors was increased from nine to twenty-two. At this meeting the proprietors voted to offer one-half of the town to settlers, and chose a committee, consisting of Colonel William

Dudley, Captain Joshua Lamb, Captain Thomas Howe and Captain Samuel Ruggles, to determine which half should be opened for settlement, and which should be reserved for later and more advantageous sale. They decided to offer for occupation the eastern half. On the 14th day of May the allotment was made; and the next day the committee came to Leicester to locate the lots. In June the township was, by order of the General Court, surveyed by John Chandler, "to fix the bounds."

Fifty "house-lots," of from thirty to fifty acres each, were laid ont, and sold for one shilling an acre, with " after rights " of one hundred acres for each ten acres of "house-lot." Thus the purchaser secured a farm of five hundred and fifty acres for fifty shillings. The lots were to be settled in three years or forfeited for the benefit of the public. One lot of forty acres was to be reserved for the ministry, one of one hundred acres for schools, and three lots of thirty acres each for mills.

Special grants were also made of seven and a half acres of "meadow," to each lot, for "feed." These meadows were evidently regarded as of special value ; but the event has proved that the hilly ridges and slopes are more productive. The cedar swamps were left undivided.

The lots were numbered, and the purchasers drew for choice. The first choice was drawn by John Stebbins. He chose the lot on Strawberry Hill, on which the honse of Rev. Samnel May now stands. Here the first house in town was probably built.

At a meeting of the proprietors, held July 23, 1722 a committee of the proprietors was appointed to con- vey deeds to those who had complied with the terms of purchase. The deed itself was not, however, ex- eented till January 11, 1724, (O. S.), more than forty- seven years after the purchase of the town. It was recorded November 29, 1729.

The names of purchasers were John Stebbins, Joseph Stebbins, James Wilson, Samuel Green, Arthur Carey, Moses Stockbridge, Hezekiah Russ, John Peters, William Brown, Thomas Hopkins, Daniel Denny, John Smith, Ralph Earle, Nathaniel Kanney, Samnel Stimpson, Benjamin Woodbridge, John Lynde, Josiah Winslow, Josiah Langdon, Joshua Henshaw, Joseph Parsons, Nathaniel Rich- ardson, John Menzies, Joseph Sargent, Daniel Liver- more, James Southgate, Daniel Parker, William Brown, Thomas Baker, Richard Southgate, William Green, Samuel Prince, Dorothy Friar, Thomas Dexter, William Kean, James Winslow, Stephen Winchester, Paul Dudley, John King.

Thomas Baker and Joseph Parsons did not settle in Leicester.

These men and their families, and those who had already joined them, together with those who soon afterward united their fortunes with the infant colony, were the founders of Leicester. Some of them were men of superior quality. To the hardships and toils

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of these pioneer families, to their intellectual and moral character and their Christian fortitude, the town is largely indebted for its prosperity and its worthy standing and honorable history.

The settlement of the place began soon after the allotment was made. In a few instances the purchasers engaged families to hold the lots for them, but others took direct possession.

According to early traditions, the first inhabitants found upon their arrival a solitary hermit, named Arthur Carey, living on the hill which from him was named Carey's Hill. Whitney, in his County History, states that he " went thither and digged a cave in the side of this hill, and lived there as a hermit many years, while that part of the country was in its wilder- ness state." What were his feelings when his solitude was disturbed by the approach of civilization no one now can tell, nor what had been the romance or the tragedy of his life, nor why he had retired from the world and buried himself in the lonely forest.

Leicester was then an unbroken wilderness. Wor- cester was just beginning, for the third time, to be re- settled. There was no settlement of whites, except Brookfield, between Leicester and the Connecticut River. Bears and wolves and wild-cats and moose and other wild beasts roamed undisturbed in the forests, and the place was infested with serpents. The dams and curious homes of the beaver were long afterward visible in the meadows. There were, as late as 1740, pits for the capture of wolves; and the names " Moose Hill," "Raccoon Hill " and " Rattle- snake Hill" are suggestive of realities familiar to the early inhabitants, while " Bald Hill" stood peculiar as a tract of land which had been already cleared.

The first town-meeting of which there is any record was on March 6, 1721-22, althongh meetings had evi- dently been held for two or three years previously. A meeting-house had already been built. Judge John Menzes had served the town in the General Court the year before, and was re-elected the two succeeding years. He declined any remuneration for his services, "being fully satisfied and paid." The precedent thus established was so popular that when, in 1724, a suc- cessor was to be elected, it was voted that whoever should be chosen "should be paid the same as Judge Menzes and no other." Lieutenant Thomas Newhall was then elected "to serve on the above conditions."

At the first recorded town-meeting Samuel Green was chosen moderator, first selectman, first assessor and grand juror. The town offices then were the same as those now filled at town-meeting. Two tithing- men were also elected to keep order in the meeting- house.

At first the families were sheltered in rude log- houses. The first impression which one of these houses made upon the mind of a little child is indica - tive of their outward aspect. Daniel Henshaw came to Leicester about thirty-four years after its first set- tlement to take possession of a house already built for

the family. The household goods had been moved from Boston on an ox-cart. As the family approached the house, by the narrow cart-path, the little daughter exclaimed "Oh, father, this is Leicester jail, isn't it?" In this household was a dog, named Hero, which came with the family from Boston. There was then no regular means of communication with the outside world, and Hero was for several years the mail-carrier of the family. Receiving verbal instructions as to his destination, he hastened at a rapid pace to Boston, with letters fastened to his neck, delivered them as directed, and after rest and refreshment returned with letters to the home friends.

In February and March of 1717, when there were only a few families here, and these were provided with hardly more than temporary shelters, the whole of New England was visited with a series of snow storms of almost unparalleled severity. For several weeks uo mails could reach Boston, and when they came they were brought by men on snow-shoes. The low houses were covered so that in some cases the chim- neys could not be seen. Families for days were prison- ers in their own houses, and first made their exit from the attic windows. Many domestic animals perished, and some were said to have been rescued alive weeks afterward. After the storm ceased, cattle could be seen walking over drifts twelve feet deep, and feeding upon twigs on the tops of trees. Such was the welcome of these hills to the men and women who settled Lei- cester.

It was not far from this time that Dr. Thomas Green, then a boy of eighteen years, was left alone, in the summer, in charge of his father's cattle. Attacked with a fever. he sheltered himself under a shelving rock, by the stream on which his father's mill after- ward stood. Here, alone in the wilderness, his shrewd- ness saved him. He tied one of the calves within reach, and as the cow came to it, nourished himself with her milk. In this distressing condition he re- mained till found by passing land-owners, in the vicin- ity. They hastened on to inform his friends. His father at once came and removed him back to Mal- den, on horseback-a four days' journey.

The progress of the settlement for many years was slow. Its location was isolated, and the people, on their scattered farms, must have been lonely in the extreme. Expected and unexpected difficulties op- posed their prosperity. The soil was hard and cold, although in many parts rich and strong. They cut down the forests and cleared the fields, they were busy "breaking stubble," " ditching meddows," "split- ting ye hills," and making roads. They struggled with rocks, and winds, and snow, and suffered from cold, the degrees of which there were no thermometers to mark. Portions of the town were infested with rat- tlesnakes, and as now there were various enemies to vegetation. A bounty of "Six Pence pr. hed " was voted by the town "for killing Rattel Snakes." In one year, nearly a quarter of a century after the incor-

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poration of the town, Benjamin Richardson received eleven shillings as a bounty for killing twenty-eight rattlesnakes; and in 1740 the town paid in bounties forty-one pounds and three pence "for killing rattle- snakes, jays, red and gray squirrels, red-headed wood- beckers, and black birds," and even then there were 'pits " for the capture of wolves.

The life of the town in the last century was primi- ive and rural. The cattle ran at large, and the office of " hog rieve" was no sinecure. In the town records are voluminous minutes of the special marks which each person adopted to distinguish his own cattle; had of the horses, cows, hogs, "hiffers," "steares," etc., which had " strayed " and were "taken up in lamiag." The question annually came up whether 'horses might go at large, being fettered and clogged is the law directs," and whether "hoggs " should " go t large, yoked and ringed as the law directs."

Even the best of the houses were devoid of archi- ectural attractions, and of the conveniences and com- forts which we regard essential. They are described s "small, low one-story buildings," with a " front oom and kitchen," and in some cases an added bed- room. The hinges of the doors were of wood; there vere no handles; and the wooden latch was raised by a " latch string " passing through a hole to the out- ide. The fire in the immense fire-places served to corch one side, while the other was freezing. The hard necessities of frontier afforded little opportunity or adornment.

The people generally rode on horseback, the wo- men often seated behind the men on pillions. In .790 a lady, attended by her husband, rode from Leicester to Vermont on horseback, holding a child wo years old in her arms. In 1733 there were four hairs ia town. Daniel Henshaw's family came to Leicester in a chaise in 1748. In his account-book hat year and onward there are charges for the use of " chair." The rate from Leicester to Boston or Malden was three pounds. . There was not a " buggy vagon " in town till 1810. Books were rare. Thomas Earle was repairing watches in 1768 and later. In Dauiel Henshaw's account-book is a memorandum of is verbal agreement to "take care," for a year " of is watch when wanted, for one cord of wood." Vatches, clocks and looking-glasses, however, were videatly rare. The hour-glass measured the hours, ad " dinner-time" was indicated by the shadow at he " noon-mark " on the window-sill.

In 1722 the town voted that if Joseph Parsons would uild a " corn-mill it should not be taxed." The mill was bon afterward erected at the outlet of "Town Meadow," 'here Sargent's brick factory now 'stands. The first aw-mill was built by Captain Samuel Green, at Green- ille. He also, in 1724, built a grist-mill on the same tream, where Draper's grist-mill now stands. The Mill lot " of Thomas Richardson also came, prob- bły, into his possession, so that he became the owner f the original mill lots. The second saw-mill was

built by Richard Southgate, in Cherry Valley, on the Auburn Road. William Earle had a grist-mill on " Hasley Brook " before 1730.

There was a carpenter here in 1717, and a few years later two other carpenters, a mason, a wheelwright and a tailor.

There was plenty of land, and land which had been secured at low rates. But, although the first distribution was on equitable terms, the equality of ownership did not long continue, and it came to pass, in the buying and selling of " rights," that some of the farms contained from twelve to fifteen hundred acres.

Even that early period of labor and struggle was not exempt from class distinctions and jealousies. Some of the families that came early to Leicester were in those days regarded as rich. Some were well-edu- cated and refined. Coming thus from Boston, which had been settled a hundred years, their style of dress and their manners were doubtless somewhat in contrast with those of some of their neighbors. Soon after the family to which reference has already been made came to town, the congregation, one Sunday, was startled by the entrance of a man dressed in small-clothes, a green calamanco coat and gold-laced hat, and with a cavalry sword hanging at his side, which thumped against the floor as he strode to his seat. When asked, at the close of the service, the occasion of this re- markable display, he said, " It is to let the Henshaws know that there is a God in Israel."

In 1722, when there were hardly fifty families on the scattered farms in the wilderness, the Indians of Maine and Canada resumed hostilities. This war is called " Lovell's War," from its most tragic incident, " Lovell's fight," in which Colonel Lovell routed the savages, but lost his own life on the shore of the beautiful lake in Fryeburg, Maine, which bears his name.

There were no general engagements in this region, but the frontier towns were harassed and kept in fear four years by roving bands of Indians, who lurked in the woods waiting to shoot down or capture their un- suspecting victims. The tidings that Worcester was threatened, and that three men had been shot and scalped in Rutland, naturally alarmed the people of Leicester. Although there are no traditions of similar attacks here, the marks of bullets in the fortified King house remained for a century afterward. In a letter to Lieutenant-Governor Dummer, Thomas Newhall gives information that " a man reaping here, informs us an Indian had got within seven rods of him, and, looking up, he had a certain discovery of him; and stepping a few rods for his gun, he saw him no more, but hastened home."

Draper, also, in his " History of Spencer," informs us that "the earlier settlers of the town were frequently alarmed and disturbed by small parties or individual Indians prowling about the neighborhood, or through the town." Indians were also said to have been seen

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HISTORY OF WORCESTER COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

in the woods southwest of Greenville; but they were deterred from making an attack by the fact of forti- fied houses in that neighborhood.

Iu 1722 two Worcester men were sent to Leicester as scouts. In the correspondence of those years there are affecting references to the sad, anxious and defenceless condition of the people. In an appeal for help from Worcester, in 1724, to Colonel Jolin Chandler, of Woodstock, who had command of the defensive forces in this vicinity, there is this signifi- cant reference to Leicester: "As to Leicester, the people there more need help from us than are able to render us any." Colonel Chandler himself, in a let- ter to Lieutenant-Governor Dummer, seconding the request for protection, expresses his regret, in view of the disappointment of "the poor people of Worces- ter, Leicester," etc., in not receiving it, and pleads for " consideration of the distressed circumstances of the poor people of these towns." Soon after, twenty- nine soldiers were posted in Leicester.

The next April the Lieutenant Governor gave Col- onel Chandler notice of the approach of several par- ties of Indians from Canada, and ordered him to visit and warn the towns. The whole region was soon thrown into consternation by tidings that two companies of Indians were between them and "the Warchusetts," and the citizens of Leicester applied to the Lieutenant-Governor for speedy assistance of soldiers to defend them. "Our number of inhabit- ants," they write, "is very small, and several were mueh discouraged ; it was so late last summer before we had soldiers that we were exceedingly behind with our business." That year the town was, by the General Court, released from the payment of the " Province tax " of seven pounds, on account, as the people in their petition say, "of being a frontier," and " being very much exposed and reduced to very low circumstances by the late Indian war."

The house of the minister was, at the first, sur- rounded by a "garrison" or stockade, and in 1726 this defense was, by vote of the town, repaired and strengthened. There was also a garrison on the place of Judge Menzes, the outlines of which, near the Henshaw place, remained till the middle of the present century. A house at Manuville was also for- tified. The house of John King, between Leicester and Greenville, was made a fort. This house still stands, a solitary relic of those early times.

After its early trials and struggles, the town seems to have prospered generally as a farming community. Some of the early inhabitants were men of means, as well as of culture and standing, and other valuable families came into town. The farms greatly increased in value, and, with the building of better houses, the removal of the forests and the laying out and im- provement of roads, the prosperity and comfort of the people were increased. Still, the growth of the place was slow, and there were repeated periods of great trial and depression. After forty years, there

were less than one hundred families in the Eastern Pre- cinct. At the time of the Declaration of Independ- ence the population was ten hundred and seventy- eight. There was no increase during the war. At the opening of the present century the number was eleven hundred and three.

During a considerable portion of the last century the town, like other communities, suffered from the depreciation of the currency, and losses from State loans and private banking enterprises. These diffi- eulties confronted the settlers almost at the first, and were increased by the heavy demands made necessary by snecessive wars; in the time of the Revolution paper-money depreciated so rapidly that it became necessary to rate its value every few weeks. It finally became worthless.

Even in these circumstances money was counter- feited, aud in 1747 we find the town voting Mr. William Green the sum of "2 pounds towards the counterfeit bill he took as town treasurer."

The danger of small-pox at times called for town action. The question of establishing an inoeulating hospital was evidently a subject of controversy. It was finally disposed of in 1777 (after being repeatedly deferred) by a vote "that the physician provide a hospital at his own cost, subject to the selectmen.' September 17, 1792, the town " voted to have small- pox in town by inoculation."

At the March meeting in 1771 the town voted " that a list presented by the selectmeu of the names of those persons who have come into town, and the place where they came from since June 1, 1767, be put on the town records, in order that posterity may know when and from whence they came, and that the selectmen be directed to present such a list at the town-meeting in March for the future." Such a list was presented every year; notices were recorded of persons who came to town until the year 1786 ; and as late as 1793 certificates were recorded of persons taken into houses and families.

On the afternoon of July 10, 1759, the town was visited by a remarkable cyclone. Two numbers of the Boston Post of that time are largely devoted to the details. It struck the tavern-house of Mr. Sam- uel Lynde, the last on the road to Spencer, passing from southwest to northeast. The house was lifted a considerable distance from its foundations, "and in the space of two minutes tore all to pieces." Several persons in the house were severely injured. " A little girl, being also at the Door, was carried by the Force of the Wind upwards of 40 rods, and had an arm broke." Four women were afterwards found in the cellar, "but could give no account how they got there." Articles from the house were found in Hol- den, ten miles distant, and "a wateh was taken up above a mile from where the house stood." The barn and farm buildings were " torn to pieces," and a horse was killed. Trees were torn up by the roots, and fences broken down. A negro " standing at the

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oor of that House was carried near 10 Rods Distance the Air," and was so much injured that he died ; nd "a Pile of Boards ('tis said 7,000 Feet), being ear the house, was shivered to Splinters, and carried a great Distance, so that there was not Pieces rge enough to make a Coffin to bury the Negro in." It is said that purchasers who drew lots on the Connecticut Road, near what is now the line between leicester and Spencer, expected, as was natural, that is would be the centre of the town, with all the Ivantages of such a position. But favorable as that cality might have been as the site of a village, the asis of separation between the two parts was laid at le beginning, when the eastern half was selected for rior occupation. After disposing of the eastern ortion, the proprietors divided the western half mong themselves, and the farms began slowly to be ken np. Before 1725 there were only three families this part of the town. The two sections were so r apart, and the circumstances of their early settle- ent were so unlike that their interests were never lentical. There were differences with reference to ying out roads and the adjustment of appropria- ons; and the western portion was not satisfied to be ithout a minister, and desired to have the money ised by them for the ministry used for a minister in leir part of the town. They also wished to be ex- upted from taxation for the schools, the advantage f which they did not enjoy. In 1741 the inhabitants etitioned to be " set off" as a town. The General ourt readily passed an act of incorporation, but it as vetoed by Governor Shirley.

In 1744, July 18th, they were incorporated as a arish, and called "The Westerly Parish of Leices- r." Five years later both precincts petitioned the eneral Court "to erect the west part of Leicester to a distinct and separate town." A bill of incor- ration was passed, but it was vetoed by Lieutenant- overuor Phipps, on the ground that it would in- ease the number of representatives to the General burt. The House protested against the arbitrary tion of the royal executive, but without effect. In pril, 1753, the precinct was made a district, with all e prerogatives of a town except that of sending a presentative to the General Assembly. The bill as signed by Lientenant-Governor Spencer Phipps, pril 12, 1753, and his honor condescended to have e town called after his own first name. In 1775, bon the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, the svn assumed its right to send a representative to the ssembly, and in 1780 the right was made constitu- nal.

Upon the incorporation of Paxton, February, 1765, strip of land two miles in width was set off to that wn; and when Ward (now Auburn) was incorpo- ted, April 10, 1778, the town parted with a small act of land.

CHAPTER LXXXVIII.

LEICESTER-(Continued.)

FRENCH AND REVOLUTIONARY WARS.

Leicester in the French Wars-Louisbourg-Mussacre of Fort William Henry -Quebec-Colonel William Henshaw-Revolutionary War-Leading Patriots-Town Meetings-" Instructions"-Committee of Correspon" douce-" Minute-men " proposed-Tea-Courts-Provincial Congress- Ammunition Stored-19th of April-Colonel William Henshaw's Orderly Books-Bunker Hill-Peter Salem- Provincial Congress-Suspected Per- sous- War Expenses-Soldiers-Leicester Men in the Service.

FRENCH WAR .- The history of the connection of Leicester with the wars of the last century shows how true it is that the life of a little settlement in the interior is identified in all its interests with the great movements of society and of nations. The people of Leicester had a somewhat prominent part in shaping, as well as in determining, some of the great issues which distinguished the last century. The convul- sions of the old world, and the conflicts between the old world and the new, were felt on the hills of Lei- cester. While the people of the town were occupied with their arduous labors, and were struggling with the difficulties of a new country and of frontier life, they also accepted their full share of the service, and the burden of these exhausting wars in which the ener- gies of the province were so largely engaged during the middle portion of the century.

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History of Worcester County, Massachusetts : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Vol. I, Part 183

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1889 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1576

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1576