USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Hingham > History of the town of Hingham, Massachusetts, vol 1 > Part 21
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the sayd Towneshippe of Hingham belonging or any wayes app'taineing with all and singular thapp'tenences unto the p'misses or any part of them belonging or any wayes app'taineing : And all our right title and interest of and into the sayd p'misses with their app'tenences and every part and p'cell thereof to have and to hold All the aforesayd Tract of land which is- the Towneshippe of Hingham aforesayd and is bounded as aforesayd with all the Harbours Rivers Creekes Coves Islands fresh water brookes and ponds and all marshes ther unto belonging with the threescore acres of salt marsh on the other side of the River (viz.) on Scittiate side with all and sin- gular thapp'tenences to the sayd p'misses or any of them belonging unto the sayd Joshua Hubberd and John Thaxter on the behalfe and to the use of the sayd inhabitants who are the present owners and proprietors of the present house lotts in hingham their heires and assignes from the before- named time in the yeare of our Lord God one thousand six hundred thirty and four for ever And unto the only proper use and behoofe of the (the) sayd Joshua hubberd and John Thaxter and the inhabitants of the Towne of hingham who are the present owners and proprietors of the present house lotts in the Towne of Hingham their heires and assignes for ever. And the said Wompatuck Squmuck and Ahahden doe hereby covenant promise and grant to and with the sayd Joshua hubberd and John Thaxter on the behalfe of the inhabitants of hingham as aforesayd that they the sayd Wompatuck Squmuck and Ahahdun - are the true and proper owners of the sayd bar- gained p'misses with their app'tenances at the time of the bargaine and sale thereof and that the said bargained p'misses are free and cleare and freely and clearely exonerated acquitted and discharged of and from all and all maner of former bargaines sales guifts grants titles mortgages suits attach- ments actions Judgements extents executions dowers title of dowers and all other incumberances whatsoever from the begining of the world untill the time of the bargaine and sale thereof and that the sayd Joshua hubberd and John Thaxter with the rest of the sayd inhabitants who are the present owners and proprietors of the present house lotts in hingham they their heires and Assignes the p'misses and every part and parcell thereof shall quietly have hold use occupy possese and injoy without the let suit trouble deniall or molestation of them the sayd Wompatuck : Squmuck and Ahad- dun their heires and assignes : and Lastly the sayd Wompatuck : Squmuck and Ahadun for themselves their heires executors administrators and as- signes doe hereby covenant promise and grant the p'misses above demised with all the libertys previledges and app'tenences thereto or in any wise be- longing or appertaineing unto the sayd Joshua Hubberd John Thaxter and the rest of the sayd inhabitants of Hingham who are the present own- ers and proprietors of the present house lotts their heires and assignes to warrant acquitt and defend forever against all and all maner of right title and Interrest claime or demand of all and every person or persons whatso- ever. And that it shall and may be lawfull to and for the sayd Joshua Hubberd and John Thaxter their heires and assignes to record and enroll or cause to be recorded and enrolled the title and tenour of these p'sents according to the usuall order and maner of recording and enrolling deeds and evedences in such case made and p'vided in witnes whereof we the aforesayd Wompatuck called by the English Josiah sachem : and Squmuck called by the English Daniell and Ahahdun Indians : have heere unto set our hands and seales the fourth day of July in the yeare of our Lord God one thousand six hundred sixty and five and in the seaventeenth yeare of the raigne of our soveraigne Lord Charles the second by the grace of God
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History of Hingham.
of Great Brittanie France and Ireland King defender of the faith &c. 1665. - -
Signed sealled and delivered In the presence of us :
JOB NOESHTEANS Indian 1 the marke of W WILLIAM MAN- ANANIANUT Indian the marke TO of (L. s.) WOMPA- TUCK called by the English JOSIAH cheif sachem.
the marke of 8 ROBERT MAMUN- TAHGIN Indian
JOHN HUES
the marke _ of SQUMUCK (L. S. ) called by the English DANIELL sonne of Chickatabut.
MATTIAS Q BRIGGS
the marke of P JOB JUDKINS
the marke m of AHAHDEN (L. S.)
Josiah Wompatuck Squmuck Ahahden Indians apeared p'sonally the 19th of may 1668 and acknowledged this instrum't of writing to be theyr act and deed freely and voluntary without compulsion, acknowledged before
JNO. LEVERETT, Ast.
It needs but a glance at the names of the early settlers of Hing- ham, as given above by Mr. Lincoln, to recognize the founders of some of the most respectable and influential families of Massa- chusetts. Few names are more distinguished in the annals of the Commonwealth or nation than that of Cushing. There is reason to believe that Abraham Lincoln was one of the many descendants from Hingham stock who have made it illustrious in American history. Nearly all of the names in the foregoing lists are still familiar in this generation. These first settlers were men of character and force, of good English blood, whose enterprise and vigor were evident in the very spirit of adventure and push which prompted their outset from the fatherland and their settlement in the new country. They were of the Puritan order which followed Winthrop rather than of the Pilgrim element that settled at Ply- month a few years earlier. The distinction between the two is now well understood. The Pilgrims were Brownists or Separatists, later called Independents, opposed to the national church, insist- ing on separation from it, and reducing the religious system to the simplest form of independent church societies.
Indeed it was natural that the spirit that led to reform and greater simplicity in church methods and organization, which was the aim of the Puritans, should go still further and demand entire separation and independence, which was Separatism, and of which the most illustrious type is found in the Pilgrims who sailed in the " Mayflower," and settled in Plymouth in 1620. It is to be noticed that those who thus went to the extreme of ecclesiastical independence were consistent in granting the same liberty to others which they claimed for themselves; and it is true that the Pil- grims were more tolerant than the Puritans. Lying on the border-line between the jurisdictions of Plymouth and the Massa- chusetts Bay, the first settlers of Hingham are not to be too closely identified with either. They were within the outer limits of the
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Early Settlers.
Puritan colony, but from an early day they manifested a good deal of independence of the Boston magnates ; and Peter Hobart's de- fiant attitude towards Governor Winthrop is one of the picturesque features of that early time. There is sometimes, undoubtedly, an inclination to exaggerate the religious element in the early settle- ments of New England. It was a mixed purpose that animated our forefathers. There was in them the genius of adventure and enterprise which in later days has peopled our own West with their descendants ; there was the search for fortune in new coun- tries over the sea ; there was the spirit of trade and mercantile in- vestment ; there was the hope of new homes, and the ardor of new scenes, all clustering around what was unquestionably the central impulse to find a larger religious freedom than the restrictions, legal or traditional, of the old country afforded. This is evident from the fact that while the population of Massachusetts grew rapidly by accessions from England till the execution of Charles the First, yet, as soon as that event happened, the republic of Cromwell and the supremacy of Puritanism during his Protec- torate were accompanied by a practical suspension of immigration to New England. For the next two hundred years it had little other growth than that which sprung from its own loins.
In these first settlements the ministers were the leaders. Their influence was supreme. They gave tone to the time, and color to history ; and the communities which they largely moulded seem, as we look back upon them, to be toned by the ecclesiastical atmos- phere which the clergy gave to them. But with all this there was still all the time an immense deal of human nature. The picture of the early time, if it could be reproduced, would present a body of men and women engaged in the ordinary activities of life, culti- vating the farms, ploughing the seas, trading with foreign lands and among themselves, engaged in near and remote fisheries, maintaining the school, the train-band, and the church, holding their town-meetings, - a people not without humor, not altogether innocent of a modicum of quarrel and greed and heart-burning, yet warm with the kind and neighborly spirit of a common and inter- dependent fellowship. The Massachusetts settlers indulged in no mere dream of founding a Utopia or a Saints' Rest. They were neither visionary philosophers nor religious fanatics. Their early records deal with every-day details of farm and lot, of domestic affairs, of straying cattle and swine, of runaway apprentices and scolding wives, of barter with the Indians, of whippings and stocks and fines for all sorts of naughtinesses, of boundaries and suits, of debt and legal process and probate, of elections and petty offices civil and military, and now and then the alarum of war and the inevitable assessment of taxes. They smack very much more of the concerns, and the common concerns, of this world than of concern for the next. They are the memoranda of a hard, prac- tical life ; and if the name of Hingham now and then appears in them during the first half-dozen years of its existence, it is in
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History of Hingham.
connection with a fine for bad roads, or leave to make hay in Conihasset meadows, or permission to use its meeting-house for a watch-house, or the appointment of a committee to settle its difficulties with Nantasket, or something of equally homely import. There is in these records no cant nor sniffling, none of that pre- tentious sanctimoniousness which is so flippantly charged upon the Puritans. There is less reference to theology than to ways and means ; and the practical question, for instance, of restraining the liquor-traffic and evil, seems to have taxed the ingenuity and attention of their law-makers and magistrates very much as it does in the case of their descendants. There is no waste of words in the grim sentences, but a plain, wholesome dealing with the material needs of the colony. One cannot read them and not feel the sense of justice and righteousness that inspired the leaders of the settlement, and that sought, rigorously indeed but honestly, to institute and maintain a commonwealth which should be ani- mated by virtue, thrift, education, the sanctity and sweetness of home, fear of God, and fair dealing among men. They were de- veloping that sturdy, educating, self-reliant New England town life which till forty or fifty years ago was so unique, but which since then has gradually been disintegrated and changed by the tremendous influence of the transportations of the railroad, the wide scattering of the New England seed, the influx of foreign elements, the rapid growth of large cities, the drain on rural sources, and the general change from diffusion to consolidation, and from the simplest and most meagre to the most profuse and complex material resources.
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MILITARY HISTORY.
BY WALTER L. BOUVÉ.
THE story of the settlement of Hingham and of the struggles, employments, and daily life of her first inhabitants, is one differ- ing but little from that of many other of the older sea-coast towns of New England. Alike in their origin, their religion, and their opinions, similar in their pursuits and experiences, menaced by a common danger, and, with the exception of the Plymouth Colony communities, influenced by the same hopes and purposes and governed by the same laws, it was natural that in their growth and development the little hamlets forming a frequently broken thread from the Merrimac to Buzzard's Bay, should, for a con- · siderable period, bear a strong resemblance to one another. Yet each, from the first, possessed those peculiar characteristics which differences of wealth, the impress of particular families, and the influence of vigorous leaders inevitably create. This individualism was enhanced by the effects of time, of situation, and of interest, and in each grew up the legends, traditions, and local history peculiar to itself.
If those of our own town are devoid of the dramatic and tragic incidents which light up the chronicles of Salem, of Deerfield, of Hadley, and of Merry Mount; if no Myles Standish with his mar- tial figure, no Eliot with the gentle saintly spirit, and no Endicott with fiery speech and commanding will, grace our story, and if no battle-banner like that of a Lexington, a Concord, or a Bunker Hill, wreathes about us the halo of a patriotic struggle, there is nevertheless within the pages of our modest records not a little to awaken the absorbing interest which the tales of the grandfather always bear to those of the younger generations. And the local colorings, if not of unusual brilliancy, still glow for us with all the warmth of the home-hearth, and to the quaint pictures of the olden time the mellowing of change and of years only adds a hallowing light. The chapters, of which this is one, treating of the forefathers and their descendants, from the religious, indus- trial, social, educational, and public relations in which we find them, are mainly for ourselves and our children, for our and their use and pleasure, prepared with little ambition other than to preserve and transmit a fairly accurate account of the birth and growth of our native town, - one which even to this day is typical
VOL. I .- 14
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History of Hingham.
of those modern democracies which form the distinguishing char- acteristic of New England. We cannot however isolate ours from the other settlements which already, two hundred and fifty years ago, formed, like it, parts of a complete commonwealth, with established customs, diverse interests, and self-reliant spirit.
It is interesting to observe these sturdy and half independent plantations, bound together as they were by the common laws and necessities, re-enacting, each within its own limits, much of the complex life of the province at large. They were truly miniature commonwealths, and the claims of the State and the claims of the Church received as well the consideration of the people of the village as of the deputies at the capital; and the various commer- cial, religious, and social interests made themselves felt alike in the town meetings and in the legislative and council chambers.
In each town, too, was the military organization and establish- ment, demanding and receiving from nearly every citizen active participation in its exacting and stern requirements. Like the civil authority it was, it is true, regulated and controlled largely by the central government, but it nevertheless possessed, from very necessity, much local independence.
To the story of its part in the life of Hingham this article is devoted. And here it may not be inopportune to consider briefly a phase in the history and policy of the colony, and indeed of the other colonies as well, which has perhaps not at all times been accorded its full value, and which is well illustrated in the record and experience of our own town. From their situation and sur- roundings the North American colonies were necessarily little less than military provinces, whose armed forces were their own citizens. Of them Massachusetts was the most prominent, and her usual condition was that of an armed peace, with many of the incidents of martial law, not infrequently broken by open hos- tilities with her Indian and French neighbors. For more than one hundred years succeeding the organization of the government, a large portion of the legislative enactments pertained to the arm- ing and disciplining of the inhabitants, to the erection of forts, the purchase of military stores, and to other measures of defence and offence ; and no inconsiderable part of her expenditure was for the raising and equipping of troops, and for expeditions against the Indians and against Canada. The laws on these subjects were frequent, minute in their details, and often severe in their require- ments ; and they affected not only the individual citizen, but reached the towns in their corporate capacity and prescribed their duties as well.
These enactments, with frequent experience in actual service, produced not only a hardy, disciplined, trained citizen soldiery ready for the emergency of the hour, but, continued as they were through the legislation of a century, they created the military tra- dition, knowledge, and discipline which were of such inestimable
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Military History.
value in the opening days of the Revolution; and into that struggle sprang, not alone the embattled farmer, but with a value far greater to the cause, the alert minute-man who had been at the taking of Louisburg, the trained-band men who, like their able officers, had threaded the forests around Fort William Henry and Frontenac, and the sturdy regiments whose leaders had climbed the heights of Quebec with Wolfe, and seen the fall of Montcalm. It is well for us not to forget that the troops of Great Britain were met in 1776, not by undisciplined levies, but by an Ameri- can army, whose great commander was a soldier of many years' invaluable experience in that best of military schools, service in the field ; that the hard lessons learned by the young colonel of twenty-one at Fort Necessity and Braddock's defeat made possible the general of Valley Forge, Trenton, and Yorktown ; that Putnam, with his English commission, attacking the Span- iards in 1762 was preparing for the sturdy old Continental com- mander of 1776 ; that Stark, the intrepid leader at Bennington, was but the Stark of 1756, grown a little older and more experi- enced; or that old Seth Pomeroy, fighting in the ranks, and old Richard Gridley, pushing on with his artillery at Bunker Hill, had both heard the roar of French guns in the campaigns which made them veterans. These, with scores and hundreds of others, both officers and privates, now enlisted in the ranks of liberty, gave to a large force the true character and discipline of an army.
One of the earlier of the settlements, situated upon the very border of the Colony and adjoining the frontier of that of Ply- mouth, Hingham was peculiarly liable to suffer from the differ- ences which might at any time arise between the governments of either province and their Indian neighbors. A realization of this danger, and consequent thorough preparation, probably accounts for the remarkable immunity from attack and depredation which was so long the good fortune of the town, notwithstanding the fact that the Indian trail to Plymouth led directly through its southern part along the shores of Accord Pond.
The Indians of Hingham formed a part of that great division among the red men known as the Algonquins. This mighty race comprised many powerful tribes, and occupied nearly the whole territory of the northeastern United States. The strength of the New England, and especially the Massachusetts nations had been greatly reduced by a great pestilence shortly before the set- tlement of Plymouth. For this the good King James was duly thankful, and he gratefully says in his charter -
" that he had been given certainly to knowe that within these late years there hath by God's visitation reigned a wonderful plague together with many horrible slaughters and murthers committed amongst the savages and brutish people there heretofore inhabiting in a manner to the utter de- struction devastation and depopulation of that whole territorye so that there is not left for many leagues together in a manner any that doe claim or challenge any kind of interests therein."
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History of Hingham.
These disasters were probably in 1617 or thereabouts. Only a little earlier, in 1614, Smith says: "The sea-coast as you pass shows you all along large corn-fields and great troupes of well proportioned people." Others computed the number of warriors at from eight thousand to twenty-five thousand. They were divided into a number of nations, and these again into tribes. Of the former, some of the principal were the Wampanoags, ruled over by Massasoit, a life-long friend of the English, and whose domin- ion lay between Cape Cod and Narragansett Bay ; the Narragan- setts, who lived in Rhode Island upon the western coast of the bay of that name, and whose chiefs were Canonicus and Miantonomo; the Pequods, under Sassacus, whose territory lay between the Mys- tie and the Thames, then the Pequod River, in Connecticut; and the Massachusetts, under Chickatabut, who occupied the territory to the south of Boston and extending as far as Duxbury. In 1633 Chickatabut was succeeded by Josiah Wompatuck. In addition to the above there were the Pawtuckets north of the Charles River, and the Chur-Churs and Tarantines in Maine. All played a part
more or less important in the history of the New England settle- ments. Hingham, it will have been noted, lay within the land ruled, until just about the time the first settlements were made here, by Chickatabut; and it was his son and successor, Wompa- tuck, together with Squmuck and Ahahden, who joined in 1668 in conveying to the English the territory now comprised in the towns of Hingham and Cohasset. For many years the intercourse between our forefathers and their red neighbors seems to have been peaceable and agreeable.
The earliest known settlement of Hingham was made sometime in the year 1633, and the first houses were probably located upon what is now North Street, and near the bay which the erection of tide gates has converted into the Mill Pond. This little arm of the sea although fordable at low tide was still of sufficient depth to float craft of a size considered respectable in those days ; and many a fishing smack has ridden out in safety the gales of winter under the lee of the protecting hills which surrounded it, and upon whose sunny southern slopes were perhaps the first cleared lands in the town.
Up it, too, sailed one day in the summer or early autumn of 1635, the Rev. Peter Hobart and his company ; they landed, as we are told, on the northerly shore about opposite to where Ship and North streets intersect, and here in the open air, the first public religious services were held. Not far from this spot, and but a few rods in front of where Derby Academy now stands, and upon a part of the hill long since removed, was erected the first meeting-house. This was a plain square building, low and small as compared with modern churches, but constructed of hewn logs and undoubtedly very substantial. It was surmounted by a belfry containing a bell, and around was a palisade for defence against the Indians.
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Military History.
Here then our Military History commences, and the church erected for the worship of Almighty God was in truth a fortress of the Lord against the heathen enemies of the body, as well as against the beguilers of the soul. Nor was the worthy pastor apparently less fitted to command in a temporal than to lead in a spiritual capacity. Of its actual use as a defensive post we have no lack of evidence. In June, 1639, according to the " Records of the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay in New Eng- land " (from which the authority for much here given is derived), " Hingham had liberty to use their meeting house for a watch house ; " and again, December 1640, " Hingham Meeting house for the present is allowed for their watch house." Already, in 1636, the delegates in General Court had ordered " that the military men in Hingham [with other towns ] be formed into a regiment of which John Winthrop, Sen. Esq., be Colonel, and Thomas Dudley, Lieut .- Colonel." This indicates the existence here at a very early period of at least a part of a company, and our ances- tors certainly had eminent commanders in two such remarkable men as Governor Winthrop and Governor Dudley. Among the interesting orders from the central authority about this time was one providing that captains be maintained from the treasury, and not from their companies ; it was evidently passed for the purpose of giving greater independence to the officers, and was manifestly in the interest of the strict discipline towards which all legislation constantly tended. It was also enacted that musket-balls of full bore should pass current for a farthing apiece ; which, although pertaining to the finances and currency rather than to the mili- tary, is a fact of sufficient interest to justify its mention in this connection. In 1635 it was ordered that no dwelling-house be built above half a mile from the meeting-house, and in this order Hingham had the honor of being specially included by name ; in- dicating perhaps that she had already shown a tendency to exceed that limit and to stretch herself out along the main street, towards the neighboring colony with which her people had later so much in common.
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