USA > Massachusetts > Plymouth County > Marion > Lands of Sippican on Buzzards Bay > Part 16
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The vote was small, 65 in favor-62 against. The meet- ing on April 1, 1839 was held at the town house, and Dr. Rob- bins writes of riding to Rochester and attending town meeting:
"There seems to be a growing alienation between this and the Town quarter of the town" he writes in his diary.
Capt. Stephen Luce of Sippican was appointed on the Board of Selectmen, and they adjourned the meeting to "Dr. Robbin's meeting house one week from today at one of the o'clock."
And the quarrel rose and fell like a great tide that at last reached every home in the three villages.
By 1844 they are holding sessions in the different vil- lages; in 1846, April, at the old Congregational meeting house,
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Sippican; November, at the Center; then two at Mattapoisett; then two at the Center again; but still the town house was at the Center.
By April 1, 1850, they consider repairing the old town house "or to sell or build a new one"; and Sippican is fighting for her life. It had taken her a score of years to decide but this year of 1850 it was all settled.
There were to be but two towns, Mattapoisett and Roch- ester. Even the new railroad was to go North through the center. There were spirited discussions about town boundaries, and George Delano and James Young drove all about one moonlight night, with a strange secret attachment "to record the lengths of the roads traversed".
Nov. 11, 1850 at the town meeting called at the Methodist meeting house, North Rochester, they voted "to hold all future meetings at the town-house in the center of the Town".
This was the end for Mattapoisett village, and she hurried about, and on Jan. 20 at the center a special meeting was called at 11 A. M .:
"To take into consideration the expediency of petitioning the legislature to set off Mattapoisett as a town by itself also that said Mattapoisett when set off as a town, may be annexed to Bristol County, and act thereon."
Mattapoisett didn't want to be in the same county even!
A committee was appointed to investigate and report on Feb. 27. It was evidently a hostile committee, and reported that it was inexpedient to petition the legislature to divide the town. Joe Snow Luce, Gilbert Hathaway and Dr. Nathan Ellis of Sippican were on the committee!
Sippican to be divided through Bartlett's Hill between the two villages Rochester and Mattapoisett! Too preposterous, and Dr. Ellis and other Sippicanners petition the General court. At this town meeting a motion was made "that in con- sideration of the great extent of territory, and the great incon- venience the citizens in the southern part of the town are put to in attending town meetings, it is advisable, and the town be- lieves it expedient that the town of Rochester be divided .. . . and that the new town or towns should receive proper shares in
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the town property." Three towns! The vote went against Dr. Ellis.
On April 7, 1851 they are at it again; and just before "Capt. George" sails out on the Herald he rides up to the center to town meeting to "see the excitement as the division of the town was the principal question and found that the people from this part of the town had things as they wished."
The vote was 197 to 127 in favor of a motion of Gilbert Hathaway.
"Whereas the citizens of Sippican are to much expense and inconvenience in attending town meeting, and for other good and sufficient reasons, it is very desirable and necessary that the southeasterly portion of the town of Rochester be set off and incorporated into a new town on the basis of the petition of W. W. Ellis and others now before the legislature praying for such new and municipal corporation".
Then Nelson Barstow got up and moved that the town vote to a division of the town agreeably to the petition of R. L. Barstow and others. Voted 204 to 93 in favor. Gilbert Hath- away moved that
"Col. John H. Clark, our representative to the General Court is hereby instructed to aid by his influence with the mem- bers of and his vote in the general court, to obtain the enactment of such acts by the present legislature; namely Incorporating two new towns from Rochester disposing and dividing the pres- ent town property and privileges, also the poor and insane, etc., as fully desired by the vote this day taken, a true copy of which together with the vote on the motion the town clerk will make and attest the same, and see they are forwarded to Col. Clark, Tuesday morning (tomorrow) and Col. Clark to present the same to the committee on towns in the afternoon of the same day."
Then they ride home and observe Fast Day, these New Englanders.
"Long may this day be kept for fasting and prayer as it was the custom of our Fathers to observe it" writes Capt. George.
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And then they go at it again!
Rochester's quarrelling children at the Old Landing on April 12 called for another town-meeting in regard to the divis- ion of the town.
And on and on it went, incessant turmoil in the meetings, with captains trying to sail the ship of state of Rochester-Towne- in-New England, with the little ships sliding into the sea and the whalers going out past Bird Island.
Gilbert Hathaway worked hard that term of 1851-52 in Boston.
It was a question whether the town set off should be Mattapoisett or Sippican.
The fight was very bitter! One of the representatives favoring Mattapoisett said Sippican didn't amount to anything.
A man could wade across the harbor!
The old rhyme was again chanted sneeringly
"Agawam and Sippican Neither fit for dog or man
In Agawam the cattle die In Sippican the people lie."
The name became a joke, so that when at last the matter was decided, everybody, even Betsy Pitcher Taber, consulted in New Bedford, was against that oldest name on Buzzards Bay "Sippican".
Gilbert Hathaway, fresh from his successful winter in Boston, suggested the name of "Marion" in honor of Gen. Francis Marion, the Southern hero of the Revolution.
It was an easy name to hail across the water.
In the coaster trade and "live oaking" the Sippican people were constantly meeting the Southern people.
They liked the South.
On May 14, 1852 the villages of Happy Alley, Old Land- ing, Sippican, and Great Neck, and Charles Neck were no longer Rochester-Towne-in-New England.
From ship to ship they hail "Marion"!
An exciting event! Fifteen years after Mattapoisett had put in the startling unnumbered article in the warrant on the
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meeting house doors and Mattapoisett is more restless than ever. And even the Pond village wanted to be set off under the name of "Clarion".
But Marion was a town five years before Mattapoisett could call herself a township, Mattapoisett who had begun the mutiny!
Marion with three peninsulas extending into the sea! Little Neck where the Indian village was and where the first settlers gathered around Minister's Rock, almost lost as a peninsula as the state road to Wareham has filled in the marshes and covers up the inlet where the old Pawkichatt River wound along; Great Neck almost divided by Wing's Cove cutting into it on the east shore, with the only high land in town, Great Hill, 127 ft. above the level of the sea, where the guns pointed towards the British troops going up to Wareham; Charles the Indian's Neck, on the West side with Aucoot Cove and a line crossing the road a long way from Bartlett's Hill to divide later from Mattapoisett town. Bird Island at the entrance to the Sippican Harbor, and Planting Island, Ram and Little Island, all Marion.
The rivers that Capt. Church crossed to meet Queen Awashonks, the Weweantic and the Sippican are a northern boundary, and Mary's Pond a partial boundary between Marion and the Center.
Back from the sea stretch three great swamps in Marion, Great Swamp in the Eastern part, Bear Swamp North East and Lawrence Swamp in the South. Almost the old Pilgrim bound- aries of eight miles by land and eight by sea, where the cattle came down to graze 200 years before. About 8700 acres with its harbor of 2500 acres still called "Sippican".
There were about 900 people in the little town, and they set to work voting about $500.00 for schools, and borrowing money from three rich captains to finance the new voyage.
There didn't seem to be any difference at first between being Rochester or Marion.
The ox carts came slowly down from the Center to the Old Landing around the bend in the road and on to the Wharf
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Village, where one might turn by the meeting house and go down to Sherman's wharf, and along the water past the Hiller farm house to Ebenezer Holmes' and Nye's Wharf, or one might turn up the road towards Mattapoisett. If one kept straight on past the meeting house and the Sippican Seminary one would be stopped by Capt. Pitcher's farm gates.
No other roads; just farm land and pastures stretching down to the water.
The sandy roads out of the village, through the pine for- est, lined with high grasses, swamp honey suckle, shad bush, and wild grape vines. No noise except the creaking of the harness and the voice of the driver; the horses, the oxen's hoofs sinking deep in the yellow sand, sounding only on the little bridges over the brooks. Little bridges of four or five logs laid down across planks, or a few rattling boards; and the horses sometimes turned down the side of the road through the brook, unchecked, to drink the shining cool water that ran under on its way to the sea, coming up with dripping legs and wheels as the carryall or farm wagon is pulled through up to the road again.
The Center came to its family salt meadows on Great Neck or Charles Neck, or went clamming along the shore that everybody seemed to own as it had for almost 200 years.
The herrings went up Mattapoisett river, and when they began to run in the April days, every father of a family went for his barrel as regularly as the dandelions showed their yellow heads. The villages reeked of herrings fried and smoked. Dozens of them were speared on long sticks, and stowed with the strings of dried apples in the woodhouses in the fall.
The captains came home from eating strange dishes at foreign tables, and straightway ordered a supper of "herring and cucumber" when they did not ask for "codfish and potatoes" or "potato bargain".
Those herrings were such a saving of provision for a large family of growing children!
Back in 1840 Dr. Robbins was writing in his diary in April:
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"Our people are doing great things with herrings. It is said that on the 13th and 15th they took one hundred thousand."
The old Rochester villages with herrings running, and ship launchings, and whalers.
"Capt. George" at home writes of going to a launching "but owing to some difficulty the vessel did not move."
The next day they try again "but the vessel remained un- movable". Once again and he was "gratified with the sight of seeing a vessel of 395 tons ride upon the Ocean with safety."
They kept on driving to the Center for parties, and the Center came down to tea.
"Capt. Nathan Briggs entertained a company of ladies and gentlemen" and for a change they took a sail in the sloop Independence. But when it was time for town meeting then the little town must sail its own course.
Very unsettling doing things on its own responsibility without the advice, in ringing tones across the town house, of uncles and brothers and cousins of the Center and Mattapoisett.
But Capt. Paul Briggs, Gilbert Hathaway and Capt. H. D. Allen collected taxes to the amount of $1580.76 and from Great Neck School district $23.62, and collected for highways $17.18, altogether $1621.76.
Soon they are spending for schools $1217.08.
There were 5 male teachers in 5 districts. The school houses were pretty poor, and it was recommended that all the school books be alike. Recommended books were the Bible, Russell's Series of Reading books, Emerson's First Part, and Greenleaf's Arithmetic, Willis' Grammar, Mitchell's Geog- raphy, Cutter's Physiology and Russell's new Spelling book.
They are reading Uncle Tom's Cabin, and talking of the death of the great Daniel Webster.
The little harbor is busy. In 1853 August 22, "Bark Emily built at Landing came down and anchored in the harbor". Two or three days later the Schooner Altamaha sailed, and the schooner Benjamin Franklin and John Frazier arrived, and rig- gers are taking out the Herald's foremast, and the Schooner John Frazier sailed. Capt. Barden is leaving for New York to
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go again on the Florida to Savannah, and Capt. Grey and other captains are going these fall evenings in New York to the Broadway Theatre. On Sept. 29, 1853 a party of them see Forest in the Character of Jack Cade, and the schooners Broad- field and John Frazier are sailing back to "Marion".
No longer master mariners from Rochester Towne, but Captains from Marion.
These are the days too when the children are running excitedly from school in "Happy Alley" to see the new rail- road, and the unemployed of the village are kept busy watching, guessing as a crew moves here and there digging great gullies and laying "sleepers", they call them, and heaping up sand. Then straight and shining as far as eye can see there is the railroad coming down through the swamps and woodland from Tremont.
The Center had one more trial, for the Old Landing was to have railway trains with puffing engines pulling in from Boston.
With the railroad, Boston comes into the life of the lands of Sippican.
"Four hundred ladies and gentlemen of Rochester and Wareham" had been shown. the wonders of this new kind of travel. They went to Sandwich, but not over the old trail by horse back. "They arrived in Sandwich" according to a local reporter "about 10 o'clock and while a repast was being pre- pared in the spacious Depot, many of the party visited the Glass Factory-Returning from there they found the tables set and bountifully supplied with sandwiches, cakes and fruit."
There seems to have been a rivalry in butter making.
Mrs. Dillingham's butter "the gentlemen pronounced the best they had tasted for the season".
"Mr. R. W. Hammett of Rochester sang between the toasts. The closing piece was "The Silver Moon" sung by Mr. Ham- mett with the ladies accompaniment also assisted by Misses Allen and Thompson which added greatly in the performance. They all regretted they were obliged to depart "but the carriage was at the door, the iron horse impatient, snorting and blowing, there- fore we got aboard."
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So the railway figures in the scrap books of the new town. Old logs and long ledgers of the Sippican outfitters, and wharfage books on whose yellowed pages are pasted with flour and water such items as how the glorious Fourth of July was celebrated in 1854.
"The people of Sippican and vicinity - who are second to none for the observance of holy days - celebrated the last anniversary of our nation's birthday in a manner becoming a joyous, happy and patriotic community, a brief description of the festivities may be interesting. A Picnic in a grove about two miles from Sippican was the object of attraction. A party of ladies was conveyed in a carriage sufficiently large to ac- comodate nearly fifty persons to and from the grove. The car was neatly trimmed and decorated in the style of the season by the ladies and their gallants. Banners, with suitable in- scriptions were furnished gratuitously by Capt. J. S. Bates.
The grove in which the tables were set was rather pleasant." The reporter goes on
"There were some hundreds of speakers and from most of them we had eloquence. After passing a few hours agreeably we returned to Sippican. Capt. Ben Handy was superintendant and Mr. B. F. Sherman was conductor in the ladies' car. They understood the important office which they occupied and, being inspired with a sense of the high calling, officiated like men.
The Sippican Band gave its services and (as Shakespeare says) discoursed most eloquent music. As the chariot entered the pleasant village, the Band performed an appropriate piece with the vocal accompaniment of the ladies. The last sounds of the music caused us to ask mentally could we have passed the day in a manner more interesting?"
And the months go by as usual, with Captains' wives meeting husbands in New York, Mrs. Clark Delano and child among them; and Capt. Russell Grey, Capt. J. Briggs, and Capt. Luce are seeing wonderful creatures at the Museum, among them a woman with a beard, and two camel leopards, one of which was 17 ft. high; and passenger cars are grinding along down from Tremont right through the Old Landing, the Depot almost the site of old Hosey's cabin.
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The Brig Abby and Elizabeth gets a notice in an old diary because she "got stuck on the ways".
"She went very prettily about her length and stopped. A large crowd was present and returned disappointed. She could not be started again that tide". They talk about the quick trip of the Baltic, 9 days, 52 m., and the next day they all turned out again, and again the Abby and Elizabeth went about half her length, and stopped. Various plans failed, so at 9 P. M. they all went home again.
Twice more they tried, and one captain examining her at low tide said she never would move.
Friday, Aug. 11 they changed the ways and "in the even- ing at 101/2 she started and went afloat".
They go to "a big picnic in the grove near the Depot, got up by the Baptist church in New Bedford with about 4000 men present"; and on the 3rd of September they attend a lec- ture in the meeting house on the "Moral Aspect of doings of the late Congress".
The young captains and mates bring home autograph albums to the ladies. If you had had a successful voyage you might afford a splendid one with pages of engravings by Dick, and water colors that would glow brightly for three quarters of a century, bought at J. G. Riker's 129 Fulton St., and grad- ually filled with blue slanting lines of sentiment
"To my friend
I cannot ask that cares and fears
Ne'er to thy mortal lot be given;
We see more plainly for our tears,
The distant shining walls of heaven,
I only ask by love Divine That all thy steps may be attended
And endless joy and peace be thine
When earth's conflicting scenes are ended."
With the albums sometimes came lockets, bracelets, or brooches in which one could press a lock of the loved one's hair.
Marion! Gradually even the whalers in the Indian Ocean heard the news. And the Center and Mattapoisett boys yell
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derisively over the water "Marion! Marion!" as they come up from the fo'c'stle, hoarse from singing the 24 verses of "Handsome Harry", "Black Eyed Susan", and "Tom Bowling". Many a gory fist fight over the superlative charms of one of Rochester's three villages was quelled by eagle eyed mates.
By 1855 the village in town meeting votes to change and improve the layout of the road from Sippican, and improve the school.
Some of the children from the Old Landing are attending the Academy at the Center.
It really was better than the Sippican seminary.
Charles P. Rugg was head of the "Board of Instruction", and besides Latin, Greek and Natural Sciences and English one could study French and the "Ornamental Branches", Vocal and Instrumental Music, crayoning, oil painting, and wax flowers.
Music was ten dollars extra, oil painting six dollars, wax flowers, three, and crayoning, two dollars.
Board was from $2.50 to $3.00 a week.
There were four terms. The Summer term lasted from June 3 to Aug. 5, and a five weeks vacation before the fall term began.
Among the 160 pupils in 1855 who were supposed to keep the rules of going to church on the Sabbath Day and keep study hours were Jennison Hall, Augustus Smith, W. H. H. Ryder and Anderson Swift of Sippican.
Sippican captains are paying "1/2 less expense for private schools". The public schools are growing better but still there is a little condescension in the attitude of the aristocrats.
In the town report "We believe therefore that the time is coming, if it be not at hand, when every man among us who thankfully remembers God, as he contemplates his broad acres, will deem that his most fortunate dollar, which he spent for the education of the children of the poor.
And we believe, that, today, if we would do something for our town to make it happy, prosperous and honored, if we would do something to make our children love their birthplace,
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and from every quarter of the globe whither their adventurous spirits may take them, turn their thoughts homeward with pride, tempered by affection, we can do nothing so effectual as the building of school houses, and the encouragement in every possible manner of education".
Education! Schools!
And then out of the stirring of pride in their own village there comes a call to the future that led to great happenings in Sippican.
1855! To W. W. Ellis, Esq., a justice of the peace in and for the county of Plymouth:
"The undersigned subscribers to the fund for procuring a library in the town of Marion, request you to issue your warrant in due form of law notifying and warning all subscrib- ers to same fund to meet at the North District School in Sip- pican lower village on Tuesday the thirteenth day of March instant at six o'clock P. M. then and there to act upon the fol- lowing articles . ."
The paper was signed by John Pitcher (a captain), Geo. E. Thatcher (the principal of the Seminary), Leander Cobb (the minister), James Luce (a captain), and A. J. Hadley (merchant) ; and Dr. Ellis posts the warrant!
A call to the future for lights and shade trees, sidewalks, roads, beautiful buildings, culture and beauty for the beloved village of the captains.
"Plymouth Co. March 1855.
To James Luce
In the name of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
You are hereby directed to notify and warn all the subscribers of a Library founded in the town of Marion to meet at the time and place and for purposes mentioned in the above application by posting up the substance of same application in two public places in same town of Marion .
In the flickering light of candles they sat there on that March night so long ago.
Grizzled men of the sea!
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Capt. Ben, the whaler and tavern keeper, and twenty-one other captains home from voyages or retired, and others, lovers like all New Englanders of their home village.
Among those who came to the little school house that night were Captain Nathan Briggs, Capt. Frederick Barden, Capt. H. C. Luce, Capt. George Luce, Capt. Peleg Blankenship, Capt. Henry Allen, Capt. John Hathaway, Capt. Samuel Luce, Capt. Obed Delano, Capt. Clark Delano, Capt. Stephen Hadley, Capt. John Pitcher, Capt. James Pitcher, Capt. Alvin Young, Capt. Geo. B. Keen.
A night that was to influence the far future of the little town; for Betsy Pitcher, the little maid who cheerfully trudged to the small school room where the Post Office is now, trying to help the family as the boys grew up, has become the rich Mrs. Elizabeth Taber of New Bedford and her village has called to her for help in making the new library.
Her brothers James and John Pitcher are on the list of signers. A library for her home village!
And the Captains listen on March 13, 1855:
"Whereas Mrs. Elizabeth Taber, a resident of New Bed- ford, but a native of our village has made the very generous donation of two hundred dollars towards establishing a public library and as it is exceedingly desirable that in order to avail ourselves of its full benefit, provision should be made for its future increase and permanence, therefore we whose names are undersigned do organize ourselves into a body coperate to be known as the Marion Library Association, and in furtherance of the object do adopt the following as our Constitution & By- laws
Thus begins the old record of Mar. 13, 1855. It took the standing committee some weeks to compose a suitable letter of thanks for the donation for books.
Sippican, 28 July, 1855.
Mrs. Taber
The Marion Library Association at their first meeting, for organization, instructed their committee to tender you the thanks of the coporation for your munificent donation.
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It is therefore the duty as well as the pleasure of the undersigned to express to you the gratitude not only of our- selves individually, but of this whole community for your donation, not the less welcome because a solicited donation unto us for the purpose of founding a public library for the benefit of this your native town. It is not easy from the nature of the case to estimate the good that shall result to any community from having access to a well selected library, for the reason that intellectual and moral improvement cannot be made the subject of mathematical demonstration, but still the effect is not the less apparent to a cultivated and refined observation. That we have a library at all, we think must be attributed to your timely, welcome and truly generous donation, and for the benefit that this town (will) receive from it through years of the future, they must be thankful mainly to your instrumentality, for we believe without the incentive which you presented to us it would have been many years, if ever, before a successful effort would have been made to do what has been done at your instance. You will permit the undersigned therefore, to pre- sent to you the sincere thanks of the Marion Library Association for this particular method which you have adopted to give us the assurance that the place of your nativity is held in your remembrance and to assure you in return that in no other form could your benevolence have been more acceptable."
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