USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Dorchester > History of the town of Dorchester, Massachusetts > Part 2
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* The oft-repeated error of the anchoring of the Plymouth shallop, in 1621, under Copps Hill, originated with Belknap (vol. 2, p. 224). The relation of Winslow expressly states that the chief which they met with was Obbetinewat, one of Massasoit's sachems. No place in Boston harbor was subject to Massasoit, the Old Colony chief. This Obbetine- wat, whom they met, was only temporarily at Nantasket, and the pro- bable cause of the hostility alluded to between him and the Massachu- setts queen, was his intrusion into her premises for the purpose of catch- ing fish. It is certain that the Pilgrims were at Squantum, and the only river which they saw was the Neponset. If they had gone to Copps Hill, they would have seen two other rivers-the Charles and the Mystic.
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
CHAPTER II.
Thompson's Visit to Dorchester, and settlement on the Island afterwards called by his name .- The Neponset Tribe of Indians.
THE next European known to have visited the Dorchester shore was Mr. David Thompson, styled, in the patent to Robert Gorges, gentleman .* He had been sent to New England by Mason, Gorges, and the other grantees of the Laconia patent, in the spring of 1623, to superintend a trading establish- ment which they were making at Piscataqua (Ports- mouth).+ The Plymouth colony, suffering severely that season for want of corn, sent Capt. Standish over to Piscataqua for the purpose of procuring a supply. Thompson, having been appointed by the New England Company their agent, accompanied him back to Plymouth, ¿ where he was to meet Robert Gorges, to give him possession of a large grant of territory previously made on the north shore about Chelsea and Lynn. Gorges and Thomp- son went by land to Wessagusset (Weymouth), and thence to Gorges's grant, § and it was on this occasion that Thompson became familiar with the localities of Boston harbor. He continued his position at Piscataqua, engaged in the business of his employ- ers, until 1626. At this time he left the service of the Laconia patentees and set up for himself, for
* Hazard, vol. 1, p. 154.
+ Levett's Voyage, Mass. His. Col. vol. 28, p. 164; also Prince, p. 133. ¿ Winslow's relation, Young's Pilgrims.
§ Prince's Annals, p. 142.
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
which purpose he selected the island known by his name, within the limits of Dorchester,* and also the neighboring peninsula of Squantum, as a suitable location for his business of dealing in furs and fish. The easy access to the sea, fine anchorage, and the proximity to the Neponset Indians, then noted trap- pers, doubtless caused the selection of this spot. This vicinity was also regarded by Smith as the probable site of the future capital of New England, he having, on his map, placed the city of London upon the Massachusetts fields in this neighborhood. Thompson moved to the island in 1626,7 and in ad- dition to his own business there, was concerned with Winslow and other Plymouth people in carrying on a trading house at Kennebeck. He thus became the first recorded permanent white resident of Boston harbor (Weston and Wollaston were too transient to deserve that appellation), there being no evidence of the presence of Blackstone, Walfourd or Ma- verick till after this date; indeed, it is stated that Maverick was indebted to Thompson for assistance in establishing himself at Noddle's Island. Thomp- son probably left the country shortly before the ar- rival of the Dorchester settlers, as no mention is made of his presence after that event. Nearly
* Maverick's deposition. Blake's Annals.
+We have seen the testimony of William Trevour, William Blaxston, Miles Standish, and the Sagamore of Agawam, that Thompson was on this island in 1619. but doubt whether he made it his residence previ- ous to 1626, although he probably had claimed it before. The testimony of Blaxston and the Sagamore of Agawam prove conclusively that there never was a mill there, as has been supposed, but that what has been called the Mill Pond and the outlet thereof, was called by the former " a harbour for a boat," and by the latter a " small riuer." (See review of Young's " Chronicles of Massachusetts," in Boston Courier of August 26th and September 16th, by J. Wingate Thornton, Esq.)
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
twenty years afterwards, 1648, his son, John Thomp- son, appeared, and obtained a title to the island from the General Court, in right of the former possession of his father.
Although Thompson was the only European re- siding at Dorchester before the settlement of the Bay in 1630, of sufficient importance to have passed his name to posterity, it is nearly certain that others of less note were contemporaneous occupants of that soil with him. Hubbard says, " the scattering inhabitants that had seated themselves at Dor- chester, for conveniency of trade, before the coming of the Governor and Assistants, being removed else- where, left that place free for them that came to plant the gospel there." * Prince, taken from Johnson, speaking of the old settlers, says, "near Thompson's island lived some few planters more ; these were the first planters of those parts, having some small trade with the natives for beaver skins, which moved them to make their abode in those places, and are found of some help to the new colony. t Again, Hutchinson, speaking of the coming of Gov. Winthrop and Assistants, says, they found a few families scattered about the Bay; there were " several families at Mattapan, ¿ since called Dorchester, or rather Dorchester neck." Who these old planters were, or how long they occupied their position, must now be left entirely to conjecture. It is probable that the numerous ships which carried on the fisheries on the New England coast, from the
* Hubbard, p. 186.
¿ See Hutchinson, vol. 1, p. 22.
+ Prince, p. 242.
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
western parts of England, may have landed persons, intent on trade, at different places on the shores of Maine and Massachusetts, and we learn both from Smith and Winslow that the attractions of Massa- chusetts were well known at an early period .*
The Neponset tribe of Indians, inhabiting the Dorchester territory, may properly be regarded as the residuary legatees of a much larger and more important Indian nation, viz., the Massachusetts In- dians, said to have occupied formerly the circle which now makes Boston harbor, extending from Malden round to Cohasset, which Smith calls the paradise of these parts, t and to which was especially appro- priated the name of Massachusetts. At the time of the arrival of the Dorchester settlers (1630), Chicka- tabot was the chief of this tribe, whom Dudley, writing in March, 1631,¿ represents as living near to the Massachusetts fields (Squantum farms), and the same place is fixed by Wood on his map, drawn in 1633, as his residence. This sachem was regarded by Gov. Winthrop and the early settlers generally as the most important chief about the bay, and the assurances of friendship made by him prevented the
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* The sudden disappearance of Thompson and other old settlers in his vicinity was probably occasioned by the following cause. They were dealers in beaver, martin and musquash furs, and other peltry, col- lected by the Indians in this vicinity to a large amount. Soon after the charter, at a general court of the Massachusetts Company, holden in London, Oct. 15, 1629, it was voted that the Company shall have the trade of beaver and all other furs in those parts solely for the term of seven years from this day. This order, interfering with individual en- terprise, doubtless took away the occupation from the old settlers, who forthwith betook themselves to some other locality. Oldham-see Young, p. 148.
¡ Mass. His. Col. vol. 6, 3d series, p. 118.
# Young's Mass. p. 305.
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government from fortifying the peninsula of Boston. In their anxious desire to extinguish the Indian title to the lands, they sought deeds from this chief, and forty years after their arrival (1666), the Dorchester people procured a deed of release of their territory from Josias, the son of Chickatabot. The towns of Boston, Hingham, and several others, took the same precaution. After the arrival of the Europeans, the condition of this tribe, already reduced to less than 100 men, was by no means improved. They made little or no progress in the arts of civilized life, and they soon lost much of the energy which their for- mer pursuits imparted. Chickatabot died of the small pox in 1633, leaving a family of small children, one of whom at a proper age was to succeed him ; but long before that period arrived, the office of chief was merely nominal, and the control of Indian affairs was placed in the hands of the colonial government. Cutshumaquin, brother of Chickatabot (see Gookin), was elected his successor, probably only till the eldest son of the latter should arrive at the proper age. This chief (Cutshumaquin ) appears to have been a mere tool in the hands of the colonial government, used for the purpose of deeding away Indian lands, and acting as a spy upon the move- ments of neighboring Indians. He accompanied the colonial commissioners to Narraganset as inter- preter and assistant. It is certain that whatever may have been the former number and import- ance of the Massachusetts Indians, before their destruction by the pestilence of 1618, our forefathers found them few in numbers, depressed in spirits,
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
and for the most part exceedingly tractable. They appeared migratory in their habits; living in the spring at the falls of the river to catch fish, and at planting time near certain locations easily tilled for raising corn, and near the sea for salt water fishing. Much interest was felt for them by the early settlers, and great efforts were made by the Dorchester people to civilize and convert them to Christianity ; a duty which they certainly owed, as the main ground upon which the first charter was obtained " was the desire to propagate the Christian religion to such as live in darkness, and to bring savages to human civility." The Indians had but little use for land. They attach- ed but a trifling value to it, and parted with it with- out reluctance. The plain on the south side of Ne- ponset, near Squantum, called the Massachusetts fields, had long been used for raising corn by the In- dians. It was free from trees and shrubbery, and was soon selected by the Dorchester settlers for cultiva- tion. The Court granted to Mr. Ludlow, in Novem- ber, 1632, 100 acres of land, lying between Squantum chapel and the mouth of Neponset .* This land must have been very near the residence of Chickatabot, and the grant was made before his death. Soon after that event, there were many grants of lots by the town of Dorchester in this locality to different inhabitants. The chief whose grave was visited by the Pilgrims from Plymouth in 1621, was Nanepashemet, prede- cessor of Chickatabot, whose principal residence was
* " There is 100 acres of land granted to Mr. Roger Ludlow to inioy to him and his heires forever, lying between Musquantum chappell and the mouth of Naponsett .??
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
supposed to have been on the south side of the river, near the head of tide waters. After the death of Chickatabot, the tribe, under Cutshumaquin, seems to have confined itself to a residence near Dorchester lower falls, where John Eliot preached to them in 1646. Mr. Eliot became convinced that a position more retired from the whites would better promote their interests, spiritual and temporal, than the imme- diate proximity to an increasing settlement of Euro- peans, and solicited the co-operation of the principal inhabitants of Dorchester to further their removal. In 1656, the town granted 6000 acres of land to them, which was laid out at Punkapog, whither they removed about that time, and there the lapse of years has nearly extinguished their lamp .*
CHAPTER III.
Emigration in 1630 .- Mr. John White .- Arrival of the Dorchester Company.
AMONG the mass of emigrants who landed upon the shores of Massachusetts, from all parts of Eng- land, in 1630, the first settlers of Dorchester may be
* " The names of the different tribes in the State are as follows :- Chappequiddic, Christiantown, Gay Head, Fall River or Troy, Marsh- pee, Herring Pond, Grafton or Hapanamisco, Dudley, Punkapog, Natick, and Yarmouth. The whole number of Indians, and people of color connected with them, not including Natick, is 847. There are but six or eight Indians of pure blood in the State; one or two at Gay Head, one at Punkapog, and three, perhaps four, at Marshpee. All the rest are of mixed blood ; most of Indian and African."-Report of the Commission- ers relating to the Condition of the Indians-1849.
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
regarded as the special delegation of the western counties, the home of Raleigh, Gilbert, Popham and Gorges, that region which had almost monopolized the intercourse with the northern part of the Ame- rican continent from its first discovery by Cabot in 1497, until the settlement of the Bay, 133 years af- terwards. The people of Bristol, Plymouth, Poole, Weymouth, and the towns of Exeter and Dorches- ter, were familiar with the New England fisheries and fur trade years before the settlement of the Bay. Indeed, the first patent granted by King James, 1606, of the northern portion of the American continent, between 35 and 48 degrees of latitude, was given to certain persons in the western counties, under the corporate name of the Plymouth Council. Chris- topher Levett, the companion of Robert Gorges, writing, in 1623, says, " for matter of profit, the New England fishery is well known to all the merchants of the west country, who have left almost all other trade but this, and have grown rich thereby." Smith says, in 1623, " there went this year 45 sail from the west ports to New England, and made good voyages." The Rev. John White, of Dorchester,* emphatically the prime originator of the movement which resulted in the Massachusetts charter, and the settlement of the Bay, found therefore but little difficulty in col- lecting a company, among a population to whom the New England coast was not an unknown region, and who naturally turned their thoughts to the
* Mr. White is said to have been the author of the Address presented by Winthrop and others to the brethren of the Church of England. See Prince, p. 205.
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
shores already familiar to them, when the edicts of the star chamber and the despotism of the hierarchy first suggested the idea of emigration. Mr. White was the rector of Trinity parish, Dorchester, in Dor- setshire; and though he had not renounced the epis- copal form of worship at the time of the pilgrimage to Plymouth, in 1620, he sympathized strongly with that movement, and actually assisted the undertaking by pecuniary aid, his name being the first on the list of adventurers in that expedition. His residence at Dorchester also brought him into daily contact with the persons engaged in the New England fish- eries, and in 1623 he joined an association of ad- venturers in his neighborhood, who raised £3000 sterling, for the purpose of making a settlement on the shores of New England. His motives were pro- bably different from those of his associates, who doubt- less had purposes of business in view ; but, in the language of Bancroft, " Mr. White breathed into the enterprise a higher principle than the desire of gain." He had for some years cherished the thought of forming a community in New England, where all who felt themselves aggrieved by religious or politi- cal persecution might find an asylum. This associa- tion sent several vessels into the Bay in 1624, and landed some 30 or 40 men at Cape Ann, the place selected for the settlement. This plantation was continued about two years, when misconduct among the people and great pecuniary loss to the under- takers, discouraged them, and Mr. Roger Conant, superintendent of the enterprise, with a few of the remaining settlers, removed to Salem, with the rem-
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
nant of their effects, in 1626. At this crisis, Mr. White, apprehending the entire destruction of his project, urged Conant to remain, promising speedy assistance and new recruits. In the spring of 1628, we find that certain gentlemen of Dorsetshire, doubt- less the friends and neighbors of Mr. White, had negotiated with the Plymouth Council a purchase of the whole territory between the Merrimac and Charles rivers. A part of these purchasers, how- ever, soon became doubtful of the enterprise, and Mr. White succeeded in enlisting the support of sun- dry gentlemen of influence in London-Sir Richard .. Saltonstall, Isaac Johnson, Matthew Cradock and others-writing to Conant, at the same time, that he had the promise of further aid from friends in Lin- colnshire. The association being completed, and one of the Dorchester grantees, John Endicott, consent- ing to embark as supervisor of the enterprise, a ves- sel was despatched for New England, and arrived at Salem in September, 1628. On the 4th of March, 1629, the Massachusetts charter, granted on the pe- tition of this company, received the great seal, and early in May following three ships sailed from the Isle of Wight, for Salem, with 300 passengers, ac- companied by two ministers, Messrs. Higginson and Skilton, both of whom had been selected for the undertaking by Mr. White. They all arrived in safety before the end of June. Most of them came from the channel ports, and one of the ships, the " Lyon's Whelp," was entirely taken up by passen- gers from Weymouth and Dorchester.
No sooner was the Salem fleet despatched, than
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
Mr. White, ever active in furthering his favorite project, immediately began to assemble a new com- pany in the western counties. He wrote to Gov. Endicott, in the summer of 1629, to appoint places of habitation for 60 families out of Dorsetshire, which were to arrive in the following spring. Great pains were evidently taken to construct this company of such materials as should compose a well-ordered set- tlement, containing all the elements of an independ- ent community. Two devoted ministers, Messrs. Maverick and Warham, were selected, not only with a view to the spiritual welfare of the plantation, but especially that their efforts might bring the Indians to the knowledge of the gospel. Two members of the government, chosen by the freemen or stock- holders of the company in London, Assistants or Directors, Messrs. Rosseter and Ludlow, men of character and education, were joined to the associa- tion, that their counsel and judgment might aid in preserving order and founding the social structure upon the surest basis. Several gentlemen, past mid- dle life, with adult families and good estates, were added. Henry Wolcott, Thomas Ford, George Dyer, William Gaylord, William Rockwell, and William Phelps, were of this class. But a large portion of active, well-trained young men, either just married, or without families, such as Israel Stoughton, Roger Clap, George Minot, George Hall, Richard Collicott, Nathaniel Duncan, and many others of their age, were the persons upon whom the more severe toils of a new settlement were expected to devolve. Three persons of some military experience-viz., 3*
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
Capt. John Mason, Capt. Richard Southcote, and Quarter Master John Smith-were selected as a suit- able appendage, as forcible resistance from the In- dians might render the skill and discipline which these gentlemen had acquired, under De Vere, in the campaign of the Palatinate, on the continent, an ele- ment of safety essential to the enterprise. This com- pany assembled at Plymouth, Devonshire, where a large ship of 400 tons, the Mary and John, Capt. Squeb, chartered for the voyage, was fitted out. She was destined for Charles river, the spot doubtless pointed out for the company by Gov. Endicott, who had sent thither two Dorsetshire men, Ralph and Richard Sprague, to explore the country, the year be- fore. Roger Clap informs us that this godly company assembled with their two ministers in the new hospi- tal at Plymouth, and kept a solemn day of fasting and prayer, at which Mr. White was present and preached in the forenoon, and in the latter part of the day the people did solemnly make choice of those godly ministers, Messrs. Maverick and War- ham, to be their officers, " who did accept thereof and express the same." Both these gentlemen had for- merly been ordained by bishops, and though now thorough non-conformists, no re-ordination was deemed necessary. Mr. Clap mentions, that after a passage of 70 days, the ship arrived at Nantasket, May 30th, 1630, and that the word of God was preached and expounded every day during the voy- age. The number of passengers was 140. The dispute with Capt. Squeb, mentioned by Mr. Clap, and also referred to by Gov. Winthrop, was occasioned
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
by the company being put ashore at Nantasket. The Mary and John was the first ship, of the fleet of 1630, that arrived in the bay. At that time there were surely no pilots for ships to be found, and the refusal of the captain to attempt the passage without pilot or chart does not seem unreasonable, though Clap has sent the captain's name to posterity as "a merciless man," who Trumbull says was afterwards obliged to pay damages for this conduct.
A portion of the male passengers, ten in number, under command of Capt. Southcote, procured a boat, left the ship at Nantasket, and went in quest of the promised land. They felt their way through the islands, and reached the peninsula at Charlestown, where some Indians had their wigwams, and found one European, probably Thomas Walfourd, living in a thatched house. After dining with the latter upon a bit of fish without bread, they passed up Charles river to Watertown, and landed with their baggage for the night, probably near the present arsenal, keeping watch on account of the vicinity of Indians. They had a friendly interview with them the next day, through the medium of an old planter who accompanied them from Charlestown. After staying two or three days in a camp at Watertown, they received an express from the ship, ordering their return, learning that other portions of the company had found a convenient place at Mattapan, where pasturing for their famished cattle could be had. The Mary and John still lay at Nantasket. Mr. Ludlow and Mr. Rosseter, with the other pas- sengers, had come up to Mattapan and were subjected
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HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
to much expense and trouble to get their cattle and baggage landed. Tradition has always fixed upon the south side of Dorchester Neck (South Boston ), in Old Harbor, as the place of landing.
On the 14th of June, a fortnight after their arrival, Gov. Winthrop and his companions arrived at Sa- lem, and three days afterwards visited the Dorchester Company at Mattapan. On his return to Salem, at the request of the Dorchester people, Gov. Win- throp took the Nantasket passage, and stopped to arrange the differences between Squeb and his passengers.
CHAPTER IV.
Mattapan selected by the Dorchester Company .- The Town laid out and House Lots distributed .- Portions appropriated for Cultivation .- The Trade of Fishing.
OUR company were doubtless attracted by the salt marshes about Old Harbor, which afforded immediate sustenance for their starving cattle, still intending to make their permanent settlement on the Charles river. The long sea passage had left many in feeble health, and it is probable that the scurvy prevailed to some extent among them, as Dr. Fuller, of Plymouth, writes to Gov. Bradford, June 28, 1630-" I have been to Mattapan at the request of Mr. Warham, and let some twenty of these people blood," adding, " I had a conference with them until I was weary " (doubtless a theological
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debate ). During the summer, their investigations induced the company to relinquish the Charles river project entirely, and to establish their permanent settlement in the vicinity of their first encampment. For purposes of mutual defence and the establish- ment of social order, the Court held in London, May 21, 1629, contemplated that the settlements must be very compact, and that a certain plot or pale should be marked out, within which every one should build his house, and a half acre is named as the size of a house lot within the pale. This arrangement is recognized in the Dorchester records, and as late as September, 1635, the General Court ordered that no dwelling house be built more than half a mile from the meeting-house without leave. The spot select- ed for the town, was doubtless upon Allen's plain, south of Old Harbor, and extending far enough to include Rock Hill, but the limits of the pale are not now known. The growth of the settlement and entire subjection of the neighboring Indians, in a few years rendered these regulations needless, and left the inhabitants free to exercise their own discre- tion in selecting their residences.
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