USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Shrewsbury > Old times in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts. Gleanings from history and tradition > Part 3
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nah was among them ; her expectations had been greatly excited concerning the unusual guest for whom such a stir had been made, and who was to receive such dis- tinguishing marks of respect from the children, her imagination picturing him as some superior being. So when the tall gentleman in the plain brown suit stepped from the carriage, dressed more plainly than his guard and postillions, and she became aware that he was the great Washington, this spirited young woman of ten, whose noble ancestor's name was on the Roll of Battle Abbey, refused her courtesy and turning her back upon the "Father of his Country" exclaimed, "He is nothing but a man !" Her words, accompanied with the look of intense disgust on her face amused Washington, and calling her back to him, he presented her with a silver quarter. This quarter is still preserved in the family as a great treasure. The Farrar Tavern was a popular re- sort for teamsters going to and from Boston, as well as for military companies. Behind the house was a large open shed for the protection of the loaded wagons when the weather was wet. Another shed attached to the house contained benches and chairs where the teamsters could sit while waiting for their suppers, and shelves on which they could put their baggage. Under this shed, in the side of the house, holes were cut, one above another from the ground to the second story. These holes were of the size to admit the toe of a man's boot and by these, and the dexterous use of their hands and
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feet, the men were expected to reach through a window their sleeping apartments. This arrangement seems to have been made for the convenience of both travellers and the household, as the former could come and go at pleasure, and the latter be not disturbed.
The outside door at the back of the house opens di- rectly into the kitchen and we are told that the logs for the fire were drawn in at this door by a horse and rolled. over into the fireplace. The liquor for the bar was in the kitchen and was served through a window opening into the west front room where the bar was. The win- dow is yet in its place, as when the bar-maid passed in the sling and toddy, but it is concealed by the modern wall-paper. Near the bar can be seen the spot where the men used to pitch knives for the first drink and many names of the frequenters of this old bar-room are cut in the wood mantle above the fireplace, but the stories that made the place merry are all unwritten. In the north-east room upstairs, the Free Masons held their meetings ; there is but one door to the room and no closet where eaves-droppers might perchance learn their secrets. This is still called the "Mason's room." Across the entry is the old dancing hall divided in the middle by a swing partition, which could be raised and fastened to the ceiling by a hook when the room was needed for the dances.
The house is built after the old-time fashion-two rooms in front, a long kitchen in the back with a chim-
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ney in the middle. Heavy finished beams show around the rooms and in their corners, and across the ceiling is the piece known as the "summer." The windows are narrow and high above the floor in the quaint old style.
Major John Farrar died in 1793 and an extract from a letter written by General Ward, then in Congress in Philadelphia, to his son, shows the regard he had for his near neighbor. "I sympathize with Mrs. Farrar in the loss of my sincere friend and her kind husband. I es- teem his death a public loss, not only as a good neigh- bor, but as a real friend to good government. I have grounds to hope he has made a happy change, and I pray God to take his family into his holy protection and defend them against all the darts of their adversaries. ] I make no doubt they have many, unless the hearts of some are changed since I left Shrewsbury ; he had some open enemies and many secret ones, I fully believe."
But the name John Farrar is not associated with the tavern in this century as closely as that of Levi Pease. He was born in Enfield, Connecticut, in 1740. His father married Miriam Pease, a distant relative, whose grandfather, Robert Pease, with his brother John, re- moved from Sudbury to Enfield in 1679 and lived the first winter in an excavation which they made in the side of a hill, about forty rods east of the spot where stood the old meeting-house.
Levi Pease married and lived in Somers, Connecticut ; from there he went to Blandford, Mass., where he
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worked at the blacksmith's trade and was living there at the commencement of the Revolutionary war. He was a member of a newly formed military company, and one Sabbath afternoon when the people were assembled at the meeting-house for public worship, a messenger arrived calling the men to arms, for the war had begun. This startling announcement brought the meeting to a sudden close, the company responded on the instant to the call of their Captain and they at once started on their march toward Boston. He was with the Army during the whole period of the war, doing important work in various ways and by his strict attention to duty meriting the confidence which was placed in him. His remarkable tact and shrewdness rendered him successful as a bearer of despatches. In these expeditions he travelled on foot or on horseback as circumstances demanded ; avoiding at times the public roads, he took the by-ways, that he might protect the papers entrusted to his care and pre- vent being suspected by the tories. When his course lay across a lake, he chose to go by night, and if the moon- light threatened to reveal him to suspicious eyes, he lay upon his back in the boat and used his hands as paddles. Many perilous undertakings were accomplished while under the command of General Thomas on the northern frontier and he nursed him in his last sickness, which was small-pox. General Wadsworth engaged him to pur- chase horses and stores and trusted him with large sums of money, which confidence he never abused. "'On the
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arrival of the French fleet and army at Newport, he was directed to purchase horses to drag their artillery to Yorktown " and he foraged for the Army on its march. Lafayette was a warm friend of his and found his keen, good sense and excellent judgment invaluable to him.
The familiar story about him and his horses will not be out of place here. He had a pair of horses to sell at a time when Washington wished to purchase and an ap- pointment was made for a meeting; Pease was a few minutes late, and Washington, who never waited for any one, was gone ! He appears to have profited by this ex- perience, for his punctuality afterward became prover- bial.
In 1783 Pease went to Boston to start a new enterprise, similar to one projected in England in 1669, and which was destined to make him famous. His plan was to es- tablish a line of stages to run between Boston and Hart- ford, but his means were small and he found it difficult to persuade any one to engage with him in so hazardous an undertaking. His faith in ultimate success was so great that he was not easily discouraged and he turned for aid to his friend Reuben Sykes, who had previously driven a stage with him from Somers to Hartford, a dis- tance of twenty miles. Sykes was fifteen years younger than Pease, and his father strongly opposed the scheme and tried to dissuade his son from taking such a venture, telling him it would surely fail and lodge them both in jail as poor debtors. Rejecting his good father's advice
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young Sykes went his own way and joined forces with the " dauntless Captain." "Two convenient wagons " were secured and October 20th, 1783, at six o'clock in the morning, they left Boston and Hartford respectively. Pease drove the west bound stage, starting from the sign of the "Lamb," stopping over night at Martin's in Northboro, passing through Worcester next day and resting at Rice's in Brookfield. The third day took him through Palmer to 'his home in Somers and on the fourth day Hartford was reached. A few trips with empty stages did not de-
SpringfieldA5
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Albany 165
THE OLD MILE STONE.
ter them from persevering and their business soon became prosperous. The plan of travel was changed the follow- ing May, when Springfield was made a stopping-place and the river crossed at that point or at Enfield. By the new arrangement the stage left Boston from the "Lion," Marlboro street ; the first night's halt was at Far- rar's in Shrewsbury, Spencer being reached the day fol- lowing. Here at about the highest point between Bos- ton and Springfield the passengers were transferred to
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Sykes, who conveyed them to Hartford. The fare at this time was fourpence per mile, about ten dollars from Boston to Hartford. The business was so successfully carried on that two years later Pease became the owner of a Boston Inn opposite the common and on the spot where St. Paul's Church now stands, which was there- after the starting point for his stages. The line was later extended to New York, Talmage Hall and Jacob Brown driving between that place and Hartford. After November 15th, 1784, Worcester was reached from Boston in a single day, Hartford at the end of the third day and New York three days later. The fare was re- duced to threepence per mile and the baggage allowed to each person was fourteen pounds.
The roads were in a poor condition, and Captain Pease with his usual enterprise and energy, interested himself in their improvement and with such success that the line was extended from Portsmouth to Savannah, Ga. He made the first contract with the Government for carrying its mails, and the first mail in this new service passed through Worcester on the 7th of January, 1786. The Postmaster-General rëestablished the post office in Worcester March 13th, 1786, and reappointed Isaiah Thomas his deputy. After the death of John Farrar, Captain Pease bought this tavern and brought his family here. Those stage days were great days in the villages. along the line and when Captain Pease driving four-in- hand awoke the echoes among the hills with the shrill
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blast from his horn, announcing the arrival of the stage coach, all was excitement until the cloud of dust disap- peared and the echo of the horn died away in the dis- tance. When Captain Pease became too feeble to hold the reins and guide the horses, he entrusted the duty to a ne- gro, under whose faithful care the business continued to prosper. The master could now ramble about his farm, fishing in its brooks, while his little granddaughter Eliza carried the bait; or accompanied by her he took the luncheon to the hay-makers, and together they would listen for the welcome sound of the horn as the stage- coach came rumbling into town. In winter evenings, when the grandchildren gathered about the fire to roast their apples and chestnuts, grandfather Pease entertained them with thrilling tales of his life as a soldier when he with great peril carried despatches, or his adventures as a stage-driver. How he endured the heat and cold and storms, over the rough and ill-kept roads, and how, when the roads were blocked by heavy snow-drifts so that his horses could not travel, he would fasten on his snow- shoes, shoulder the mail-bag and plod with his load over Boston Neck. Little Eliza, now with snowy hair and dig- nified step, is the only one left to rehearse these stories of " Grandpa Pease," who died in 1824. He was buried with Masonic honors in the northeast corner of the old " burying place" behind the church. No stone marks the spot where the " Father of Stages " rests, and no in- scription recognizes the valuable services of this faithful
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servant of the Government, whose labors were per- formed in the most perilous and trying times and who had the confidence and esteem of the commanders of the Army. He was also a benefactor of the town, which owes much of its present prosperity to his untir- ing efforts for its improvement.
His long experience as a stage driver gave him abund- ant cause to realize the bad state of the roads and the necessity for better ones. After long and earnest efforts he procured from the Government the first charter granted in the State for a turnpike, and it was laid out in 1808 from Boston to Worcester through South Shrewsbury, about one mile from the "great road" and parallel with it. He lived to see it completed and to see the benefit it was to the public. It is said that travel increased and stages and heavy teams became so numerous that drivers of smaller vehicles were obliged to look well to their safety. The new turnpike naturally took most of the heavy travel, and taverns were opened at short intervals along the way.
The Balch Dean Tavern was built in the last century and still stands at the junction of the Westboro road with the turnpike. This house was used as a small-pox hospital in 1792, when this disease was so prevalent in town that several houses were used in that way.
A mile beyond, toward Worcester. was Harrington's Tavern, which was built by Captain Thomas Harrington especially for the accommodation of the stages. The
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sign bore the Massachusetts coat of arms, and was sus- pended from a rod attached to the house. On the opposite corner of the town road was the store where he sold groceries to the people of South Shrewsbury.
The tavern has been remodelled into a dwelling and a handsome residence built on the site of the old store, both being occupied by great-grandsons of Thomas Harrington. Opposite these houses is the common surrounded by beautiful maples, where stood the meet- 1 ing-house of the First Restoration Society of Shrewsbury, which some years ago was removed. On top of the hill west of these stands the "Old Arcade," once used as a tavern, an important looking building with much history laid away within its walls. Like the Balch Dean tavern its front, until the turnpike was made, was toward the south; but the turnpike was made a strictly straight road without regard to front doors or anything on either side. The Dean Tavern evidently had no respect for the turnpike, for until this day it resolutely stands with its back toward it. The first landlord at the Arcade was Daniel Stone, then Nahum Eager, Abel Wesson and following him the Munroes, Isaiah and Reuben.
At Lake Quinsigamond, down at the very water's edge, was the last tavern in Shrewsbury ; it was kept by Joseph Pratt. Several stages ran each way daily, each driver blow- ing his horn as he drew near his stopping-place, where the travellers alighted for grog and gingerbread. Until the railroad usurped the travel between Boston and Wor-
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cester nearly all the freight between these two cities passed over this road. The stages, however, by no means deserted the "great road" through town, but Levi Pease's two a week multiplied into four each day, one of which carried the mail.
Until about 1806 there was no post-office in this town, all letters being left at Worcester until called for. The first post-office here was kept by Joseph Stone in a small building which stood west of the house now occupied by Dr. Brigham. A mile beyond Cushing's Tavern, later called Haven's, was the tavern in early times kept by Daniel How and, a mile further on, the one kept by Jotham How, afterward by George Slocum and later the residence of Judge Cobb.
The Pease farm has passed from one man's ownership to that of another and is now owned by Mr. George L. Davis. In a shady nook by the woods west of the road there is a sulphur spring. To reach it you cross the lot where Old Brazil, the Indian, and his wife Nancy used to live. This spring has been of some repute at different times, the water being quite medicinal and containing a large per cent. of sulphur. It is a pretty spot to visit and a drink from the spring refreshing after a dusty walk on a summer day. Old Brazil's true name was Basil Mann. He was once a pirate on the high seas and if his blood- curdling stories were true, many a hapless craft fell into his merciless hands. He enjoyed telling with what deft- ness he could in those times split a man's head open,
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with his axe, exactly in the middle; "one-half would fall on to one shoulder and t'other half on t'other shoulder, ugh! ugh!" Such grim and ghastly stories made him a terror to all the children in the neighbor- hood as well as to some of the older people, and his habit of drinking added not a little to his native fierce- ness and terrifying power. During his life in Shrewsbury he practiced none of his evil arts, seemingly satisfied with reminiscences of the past. He lived in the small house once occupied by Lorey Pease, son of the Captain, quietly and industriously weaving baskets which he and his wife Nancy went about the country to sell, enter- taining his customers with his charming tales. These Indians must have died about the year 1850.
To show their pleasure at the departure of these undesirable neighbors, the village boys procured a bomb- shell and, placing it in the brick oven, blew the house to fragments.
SHREWSBURY
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THE BALDWIN TAVERN AND ITS
VARIOUS OWNERS.
O N leaving the Pease Tavern and turning his course westward, the traveller sees before him the white spire of the old church, standing out clear and distinct against the horizon; nearer are the roofs of some of the village houses which border the hills to the northward. Nearer yet and at his left as he descends the hill the green meadows extend to the distant woodland, and at his right they rise into low hills. In all directions the landscape breaks into pretty pictures, and while charmed with these, his eye is attracted to a ruinous building before him on the right. of the road, which excites his curiosity, and specula- tions arise in his mind which lead him into the yard and up to the very door. Three noble elms stand on the: broad common that lies between the building and the: road, and a merry brook courses along under their shadows. Before reaching the door the outline of a cellar wall is discerned, but the cellar itself is filled with the stones that once formed a chimney, and now
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overgrown with a tangle of woodbine, ivy and black- berry vines. Here, as elsewhere, Nature is striving to make beautiful a most unsightly spot. The ancient door stones are left uncovered by briar and woodbine as if to keep in remembrance the forms that once tripped lightly over into the hospitable doors beyond. Seeds from the elms have been wafted among the stones, have taken root, and are becoming stately trees, since the house sheltered the lives of the last of the generations that dwelt beneath its roof. A little beyond and toward the hills are the ruins of an old barn, whose timbers gave way before the winter's blast some years ago. The sheds have gone in like manner and the one remaining barn bears signs of soon sharing their fate.
The house that once stood over the cellar now filled with stones was the noted Baldwin Tavern, famed far and near for its good cheer and its gentlemanly land- lord. The date of its erection takes us back to the time when our orchards and fields were covered with thick forests, and a company of stout-hearted men lifted up their axes against the mighty trees, and laid the founda- tions of a town among the hills where Edward Rawson made his search for saltpetre. Nahum Ward was one of this company of men, and his was one of the forty families who settled here, established a school, and formed a church in accordance with the conditions of the grant. Nahum Ward's first dwelling-house was near the meeting-house and there his little son Benjamin died
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THE BALDWIN TAVERN AND ITS VARIOUS OWNERS
at the age of one year. This was the first death on the town record. Nahum Ward was a lieutenant in the militia service. He was an enterprising man, and, as various old deeds show, a large land-owner, adding to his original grant by purchasing from time to time many hundred acres. He bought in 1732 of William Pepperell (who afterward became famous for leading in the siege of Louisburg) and Nathaniel Balston of Boston for the sum of one thousand pounds lawful money, one thou- sand five hundred acres more or less, the land being theirs by right of their wives, who inherited it from their grandfather, the Honorable Samuel Sewall. In 1742 he purchased for two hundred pounds a part of Nathaniel Treadway's share of "the tract of land called by the name of Haine's Great Farm," which farm contains three thousand and two hundred acres. He built a number of houses in different parts of the town, but the Baldwin Tavern place he must have owned at a very early period, for he selected this spot for his own resi- dence, and removed there from Rocky Plain about 1725.
Selecting the spot upon which to build, he drew the stones for his chimney and cellar walls, levelled the sturdy oaks in the surrounding forest to get the strong- est timbers for his house, and dug a well close by that gave him a supply of good spring water which is clear and cold to this day. The cellar walls being laid and all things ready, he looked about him for men to help raise the frame; not finding a sufficient force in town he
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mounted his horse and rode off to Marlboro, arrayed in his lieutenant's uniform, to rally his men who in merry mood set out for the house-raising in Shrewsbury. The "scribe and tumble" rule for building prevailed in those days, by which each timber was fitted to its own place and would fit in no other, which explains why in old houses the beams are often larger at one end than at the other, and why no two doors or windows are the same size. In the middle of the house was the large stone chimney expressive of durability, which would outlast a dozen frames that might be successively built around it. Great, wide-mouthed fireplaces were on three sides of it, with immense stone mantels resting on the massive jambs at either end. There were double outside doors opening into the kitchen, through which a pair of oxen drew the "eight foot logs" for the fireplace. On the north side of the chimney in the garret floor was an open space about four feet square, enclosed on all sides down to the cellar, with no aperture save at the top. The exact purpose of this deep, dark place is not known, but it was called "the dungeon" and may have been intended for a hiding-place, as the times were perilous. A little dog once fell to the bottom and was a prisoner until a ladder was let down and he rescued from the darkness, more frightened than hurt.
The house was square in shape with two stories and a garret, and though durability was in those days the chief requisite of a dwelling-house, to this one was added
THE BALDWIN TAVERN.
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THE BALDWIN TAVERN AND ITS VARIOUS OWNERS
some display of taste in the finish, and three windows with diamond shaped panes and leaden sashes gave a little touch of grandeur to the style.
Martha the wife of Lieutenant Ward, true to her name, was a provident house-wife, and had in abundance everything necessary to the comfort of a well ordered New England home of the olden time. She took pleas- ure in furnishing her new home, arranging with pride in the kitchen dresser, her store of brass, copper and pewter utensils, shining as the dames of ancient days knew how to make them shine, displaying her silver and china in the new buffet, and fitting up her chambers with her luxurious feather beds, her fine linen and her lace pillow- biers. Lt. Nahum filled his bookcase with law books, hung his silver-hilted swords over the fireplace in the "best room" and was ready for service either as magis- trate or soldier. He was soon called upon to execute the duties of the former office by pleading the cause of the town against the people of Malden, who were trying to get possession of the now coveted Shrewsbury lands, formerly held by them in light esteem. He was the first representative to the legislature from this town and served in the same capacity seven years, holding also many town offices ; later in life he was appointed Colonel of the militia and judge of the Worcester Court. He died in 1754 and in his will mentions his wife most affectionately, charging his executors to provide amply for her comfort, giving her "six bushels of meal a year,
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220 lbs. of meat, two barrels of cyder and a sufficiency of apples for her own eating" also that "they shall yearly and every year provide a sufficiency of good fire wood, cut fit for ye fire and laid at her Door, both summer and winter." He also bequeathed to her his "Riding Chair and all the furniture thereunto belonging," and one half of all his "household stuff besides the improvement of my silver Can and six silver spoons," a goodly sum of money and two good cows. Dr. Crosby's bill for at- tendance in the last sickness of both Nahum and Martha his wife, is yet preserved, "March 25th, 1754, Col. Nahum Ward Dr. To seven visets & Sundry Medicines £. 0 -15-6 To medicine for Mrs. Patty o - 6 - 9 June 25th, 1755. The widow Mrs. Martha Ward Deb. to 8 visets Bleeding & Med. £. o. - 15 - I
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