USA > Massachusetts > Norfolk County > Dedham > Proceedings at the celebration of the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Dedham, Massachusetts, September 21, 1886 > Part 4
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Edward Johnson, in his history entitled "Wonder Working Providence of Zion's Saviour," writing about 1651, thus describes the Dedham settle- ment : -
" Dedham is an inland town about ten miles from Bos- ton, well watered with many pleasant streams, abounding with garden fruits, fitly to supply the market of the most populous town, whose coyne and commodities allure the inhabitants of this town to make many a long walk. They consist of about a hundred families, generally given to husbandry, and through the blessing of God are much increased, ready to swarm and settle on the building of another town more to the inland. They gathered into a church at their first settling; for, indeed, as this was their chief errand, so it was the first thing they ordinarily minded to pitch their tabernacles near the Lord's tent. . . . They
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have continued in much love and unity from their first foundation, hitherto translating the close clouded woods into goodly cornfields, and adding much comfort to the lonesome travellers in their solitary journey to Canectico, by eyeing the habitations of God's people in their way, ready to administer refreshing to the weary."
Such was the work accomplished by the emigrant settlers during a period of a quarter of a century. When we add to these achievements the hand-to- hand contest with the forest and the soil, the care of the herds upon which their subsistence de- pended, the monthly assembly for military training and the weekly lecture, the settlement of boundary lines and of Indian claims, we are able to form some estimate of the variety and magnitude of their labors. Lord Bacon says that in " the true marshal- ling of the degrees of honor, the first place is to be given to the founders of States and Common- wealths." Let then the highest tribute of this day be paid to the men who planted here in the wilder- ness the best civilization of their time, illumined by a simple and genuine religious faith.
We naturally desire to know something of the personal history and character of these men. First in order of precedence should be named Edward Alleyn, the leader of the pioneers. Of his English history we know nothing. He was the first Town Clerk and the first Deputy to the General Court ; and he died suddenly while attending the Court in 1642. He apparently was a layman, and his brief
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career was sufficient to stamp his name indelibly upon our history.
John Dwight was an active citizen, and was a Selectman for sixteen years. He brought with him from England his son Timothy, a child of five years, who, when he reached manhood, became more promi- nent than his father. He was the Town Clerk for ten years, and a Selectman for twenty-four years. He died in 1718, and was the last survivor of the first settlers. The name of Dwight has long since disappeared in Dedham. But Timothy Dwight was the progenitor of a numerous family, some of whom intermarried with Dedham families, while others bearing the name made their homes in the Connecticut valley, whose descendants have been eminent in many professions and callings. Each succeeding generation down to the present one has added a new lustre to the name of Timothy Dwight.1
The Rev. John Allin, the pastor, was born in 1596, but the place of his nativity has not yet been ascertained. He was educated at Caius College, Cambridge, where he took his Master's degree in 1619. He was instituted rector at the Church of St. Mary at the Quay, in Ipswich, in 1620. He was married at Wrentham, Oct. 10, 1622, where his eldest son was born. He was probably deprived of
1 Dr. Timothy Dwight, the distinguished President of Yale College, 1795-1817, and his grandson Dr. Timothy Dwight, chosen to the same office in 1886, are descendants of Timothy Dwight, of Dedham.
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his living in 1637.1 While there is doubt concern- ing some facts of his English history, there can be no doubt concerning his character and influence here. As a divine he was eminent for his learning, ability, and graces of character. With Shepard, he was a champion of the Puritan churches, and with Eliot he was a co-laborer in the conversion of the Indians. He also bore a prominent part in direct- ing the civil affairs and public enterprises of the town. He was possessed of a large landed estate, and his second marriage with the widow of Gov- ernor Thomas Dudley added to his worldly sub- stance. Joseph Dudley, who afterwards was high in office but obnoxious to the people, was educated in the family of Mr. Allin.
Major Eleazer Lusher was without doubt the ablest and most efficient man among the settlers. He was a founder of the church, the Town Clerk for twenty-three years, and a Selectman for twenty-nine years. He was Captain of the train-band, and Ma- jor of the Suffolk Regiment. He was one of the original founders of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. He was a Deputy from the town to the General Court, and afterwards one of the Assistants of the Colony for eleven years. He was also often employed in the affairs of the Colony by special appointment, and in 1671 was the chair-
1 Some new facts of interest concerning the English history of Rev. John Allin have been brought to light by Professor William F. Allen, of Madison, Wisconsin. These will be found in the N. E. Historical and Genealogical Register for January, 1887.
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man of a committee to collate the laws of the Colony. Edward Johnson describes him "as a man of the right stamp, of pure mettle, a gracious, humble, heavenly-minded man." 1
Captain Daniel Fisher was admitted to the church in 1639. He was a Selectman for thirty-two years, a Deputy to the General Court, and Speaker of the House of Deputies for three years; afterwards he was one of the Assistants, in which office he died in 1683. He was a man of high patriotic spirit, and is said to have been learned in the law.2 Toward the close of the long struggle for the preservation of the Colonial Charter, Daniel Fisher became prominent. He was one of the four whom Randolph accused of high crimes and misdemeanors.3 His children were imbued with the same indomitable spirit. It was his son Daniel of whom the familiar story has been told of leading Sir Edmund Andros through the streets of Boston, April 19, 1689. This dramatic incident rests upon a tradition in his family for authority, but it also corresponds with the historic account of the events of that day, and may be accepted as authen- tic.4 He was the great-grandfather of Fisher Ames. Lydia Fisher, the sister of the second Daniel, when
1 Wonder Working Providence (Poole's ed.), p. 110.
2 Dexter's Centennial Sermon, p. 26, note.
3 Palfrey's History of New England, vol. iii. p. 365.
4 This fact was first stated in Worthington's History, 1827, p. 51. It rests upon the authority of a family tradition, communicated to the author by Hon. Ebenezer Fisher, a great-grandson of the Daniel Fisher referred to. The statement has since been often quoted, and its truth has never been questioned.
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a young woman of nineteen, went to Hadley to become the confidential attendant of Goffe and Whalley, the Regicides, who were then concealed in the house of Rev. Mr. Russell. This was in 1671 ; and she was probably selected for this some- what perilous mission through the intervention of her brother Daniel, who had occasion to pass through Hadley on his way to Deerfield. The place where the Regicides were then concealed was known to but few persons in the whole Colony, and Lydia Fisher deserves to be remembered as a wo- man who kept not only a simple secret, but a great colonial secret, on which the lives of the Regicides themselves and perhaps other lives depended.1
There were other men worthy of special mention : Michael Metcalf, at one time the schoolmaster; Lieutenant Joshua Fisher, the keeper of the ordi- nary, and town surveyor; and Francis Chickering, Deputy to the General Court. But this was a
1 Lydia Fisher was born in Dedham, July 14, 1652 ; was married to Nathaniel Chickering Dec. 3, 1674, and died in Needham, July 17, 1737. The fact of her attendance upon the Regicides at Hadley in 1671, for about a year, is attested by the family papers. It has been asserted that her father, Captain Daniel Fisher, concealed the Regicides near his house in Dedham for a time, and that Lydia here ministered to them and rode behind one of them on a pillion to Hadley. The Regi- cides Jeft Boston Feb. 26, 1661, and arrived in New Haven March 7. They remained in concealment in that vicinity until they went to Hadley Oct. 13, 1664. It is very probable that on their nine days' journey to New Haven they rested at Dedham, but they did not tarry long. Lydia at that time was less than nine years of age, and Goffe and Whalley chid not go from Dedham to Hadley, but from New Haven, and more than three years afterwards. - PALFREY'S History of New England, vol. ii. chap. xiii.
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society in which no distinction was recognized, save that founded upon service rendered to the Colony, the town, or the church. The elders, the deacons, and the officers of the train-band were the only title-bearers. The pastor himself was only desig- nated as Mr. Allin, though the prefix implied some social distinction. In the village of 1664 we find all the names of the well-known Dedham families now represented among us: Avery, Bullard, Ba- ker, Bacon, Colburn, Eaton, Everett, Ellis, Fales, Fairbanks, Farrington, Fuller, Guild, Gay, Kings- bury, Morse, Onion, Richards, Wright, Wilson, Whiting, - all had houses here in 1664.
But the time came when the leaders of the first generation were to rest from their labors. In 1675 all save Captain Daniel Fisher, Timothy Dwight, and Richard Everard had passed away. Another generation had succeeded, and the rule of peaceful life was about to be broken.
In 1673 the Selectmen were summoned by the General Court to prepare the town for defence against the Indians, who were then incited to hos- tilities by Philip of Mount Hope. The train-band was called out for frequent exercise. The great gun, called a "drake," given to the town by the General Court in 1650, was mounted. A barrel of gunpowder and ammunition were procured. A gar- rison was maintained and a watch set. Many fled to Boston for safety. The Wrentham settlers packed their goods and brought their families to Dedham.
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All Indians in the town were ordered to depart. Dedham had some natural advantages for purposes of defence, but these precautions saved the settle- ment from attack. Philip had met the Dedham men in the negotiation of treaties, and perhaps saw good reason to avoid them. But Dedham soldiers did good service in the war. Near its close a party of Dedham and Medfield men captured Pomham, a Narragansett sachem, with fifty followers, in Ded- ham woods, which was considered an achievement of material importance to the final issue. Nor did those nearly connected with Dedham wholly es- cape the bloody horrors of that war. Besides the burning of Medfield and the deserted houses at Wrentham, in the fearful massacre at Bloody Brook, Robert Hinsdale, one of the founders of the Ded- ham church who had removed to Hadley, perished with his three sons while moving their crops from Deerfield.
The close of Philip's War marked the beginning of great changes. There had long existed a desire to extend the area of the settlement to the west and south. In 1682 a vote was passed that no one should move more than two miles from the meet- ing-house. This was an attempt to repress the disposition to leave the village. It was not un- til fifty years afterwards that new parishes were formed. But when the fear of the Indians had been quieted, the young men could no longer be re- strained from leaving the settlement. Gradually
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the first rude houses which constituted the first compact village gave way, and in their places here and there the plain was dotted with more sub- stantial farm-houses. All were farmers, and there was no village settlement again for more than a century.1
Great political changes also were now occurring in the Colony. The charter brought over by Winthrop, for the preservation of which Daniel Fisher had striven, was dissolved by a judgment in the English Court of Chancery. The colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts were united in the Province under a royal Governor. The autonomy of the Puritans, so strictly maintained under the first Charter, received its first serious shock in the guaranties to Protestants of every name given by the Provincial Charter. Dedham was now entering upon a long period of great depression. The men who had succeeded to the management of affairs were by no means the equals of the founders in education or capacity for public affairs. In spite of the care the fathers had taken to educate their children, the wilderness had proved to be a rough training-school. Their youth had been spent in clearing and subduing the soil, in planting orchards, and in building roads and fences over a wide extent of territory. There was an indifference to the means of education. The town was indicted in 1674, and again in 1691, for its neglect to support a 1 Worthington's History, p. 15.
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school. Mr. Dexter, in his Century Sermon of 1738, laments the "disesteem of learning too evident in a prevailing temper to be wholly without a grammar- school, and the negligence of the parents to send their children when they have one." He makes the significant assertion : " I think it is beyond dispute a rare thing to find among us men of common char- acter that can use a pen as many, many of our fa- thers could."1 But this low state of education was perhaps due to circumstances which could not be controlled. The dispersion of the compact settle- ment caused the maintenance and attendance of a school to be attended with serious difficulties. Before 1730 there was but one church and but one schoolmaster, who was employed but a few weeks in one place. There were many hardships in the general condition of the people. They were all de- scendants of the first settlers. There were no new- comers, and a strong jealousy existed towards them, -a natural outcome of the policy of the founders. They saw little of other people, and there were but few marriages except among themselves. The road to Boston was rough and circuitous; over it they carried the produce of their farms in panniers. They also carried to Boston oak-bark, hoop poles, oak and pine timber for building purposes, oak staves, ship timber, charcoal and wood for fuel to some extent.2 In this way they gained a subsist-
1 Dexter's Century Sermon (1738).
2 Worthington's History, p. 39.
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ence for themselves and their families. As a nat- ural consequence from such a condition of society, they had warm controversies among themselves upon town and parish matters. But it must also be said that this hard school of self-denial and sacrifice did not efface from the character of this generation their strong religious faith and their firm attachment to the church and town. If their views of life were narrowed by circumstances, they were still jealous of their civil rights, and kept them- selves informed in public affairs. They had no Lusher, whose memory as a wise counsellor was long cherished, to direct their affairs; yet they had good men in Samuel Guild, John Metcalf, and Joseph Wight, who filled long terms of office as Selectmen.
Between 1671, when Mr. Allin died, and 1723, when Mr. Dexter came, there had been two minis- ters of the Dedham church, - Adams and Belcher. A new meeting-house had been built in 1673, and repaired in 1702. The South Parish was incorpo- rated in 1730, and the West Parish in 1736. In 1748 a fourth parish was incorporated under the name of Springfield, which is the present town of Dover. All persons were taxed for parochial purposes, and all were required to attend public worship under penalties. Under the Statute of 1727-28, however, persons attending divine service according to the Church of England might have their taxes paid to a minister of that church, if such service was
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performed within five miles of their residence. In 1734 the ministerial taxes of six persons in Dedham were remitted because they carried on the worship of God in the way of the Established Church of England. In 1731 Dr. Timothy Cutler, rector of Christ's Church, Boston, began the service of the English Church, and preached in a private house in the westerly part of the town. He sometimes had congregations of fifty persons, and there were eight or nine communicants. From this time until the Revolution, these services were held at irregular intervals in different places in the town; and finally a church was built in Dedham village, and opened for service in 1761. Thus it will be seen, that, in about a century from the founding of the town, the English liturgy, the great rock of offence to the fathers, and so carefully excluded in the time of the Colony, was publicly used in Dedham under the protection of law, and accepted by some of the descendants of the settlers in the third generation.
In the various military expeditions during the French wars, Dedham men were called to bear a part. In the West Indies, at Ticonderoga, Fort Edward, Fort William Henry, at the memorable siege of Louisburg, and at the Bay of Fundy they performed military service, and many never re- turned.1 Among the names of soldiers who served in these companies will be found those of old Ded-
1 Haven's Centennial Address, Appendix, pp. 66, 67.
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ham families. It must be remembered that at this period the military spirit was maintained in full vigor, and that all able-bodied men were trained in the manual of arms. In 1757 it has been estimated that one third of all the effective men of the Prov- ince were in the field in some form or other.1 In these French wars the men of Massachusetts became accustomed to actual service in arduous campaigns, and so acquired a knowledge of the art of war which well prepared them for the great conflict of the Revolution, twenty years later.
While the eighteenth century prior to the Revo- lution was a period of depression, hardship, and sacrifice in Dedham, and, excepting the military expeditions of the French wars, was not fruitful of events, yet it was during this period that two of the most notable men in its history came here to make their residence, and at a time when they were much needed. These were Dr. Nathaniel Ames and Sam- uel Dexter, -men of pronounced character, and in different ways destined to exert a strong influence in succeeding times.
Dr. Ames came from Bridgewater, when a young man, in 1732. He inherited from his father a love of the science of astronomy as it had then been developed, and in 1726, when less than sixteen years of age, had published his first almanac, on the titlepage of which he styled himself a " Student in Physic and Astronomy." He continued to publish
1 Minot's History, vol. ii. p. 37.
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these almanacs for forty years, and his son Nathaniel, for ten years more. Dr. Ames was a man of an acute and vigorous mind, and his almanacs abound in quaint verses and scientific essays.1 His first wife was Mary, the daughter of Joshua Fisher; but she died, leaving an infant son, Fisher, who also died in less than a year after his mother. It was from this infant son that Dr. Ames inherited his landed estate in Dedham. He then married Deb- orah, the daughter of Jeremiah Fisher, who was the mother of five children. At the deccase of Dr. Ames, in 1764, his two eldest sons, Nathaniel and Seth, had just been graduated at Harvard College, and Fisher, the youngest, was only six years of age. The younger children were left to the care of their mother, a woman of great energy and force of char- acter. Fisher Ames was fitted for college under the instructions of Mr. Haven, the minister of the church, and was graduated in 1774, at the age of sixteen. Such was the beginning of a family and a name in Dedham which afterwards became the most conspicuous and illustrious of any in its annals.
Samuel Dexter was a son of the fourth minister of the Dedham church. He had been bred to business, and having acquired a fortune as a mer- chant in Boston, he returned to his native town to live in November, 1762. He soon built a fine mansion on land adjoining the parsonage, which
1 An elaborate notice of these almanacs may be found in Tyler's " History of American Literature," vol. ii. pp. 122-130.
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is still standing, in admirable preservation; and though it has been much improved, it has not been radically changed in form or arrangement. Mr. Dexter immediately assumed a leading place in the local affairs of Dedham. He gave liberally for the support of schools, and for the new meeting- house erected about the time of his coming. He was usually the moderator of town-meetings just previous to the Revolution, and the resolutions then adopted were drawn by his hand. He was for several years a Deputy to the General Court, and was several times negatived as a Councillor by the royal Governor. In the beginning of the Revolution he was for five years in the Provincial Congress, and a member of the Supreme Executive Council of State, which assisted and supported the military operations in the vicinity of Boston.
The decade which preceded the first conflict of arms in the Revolution was one of intense excite- ment, deep anxiety, and popular indignation. These found expression in town-meetings and through committees of correspondence, and finally in prep- arations for actual war. In all this period the men of Dedham, true to the traditions of their fathers, were thoroughly aroused. They had suffered much from provincial taxes levied on account of the French wars, in which they had fought the battles of England; but they were ready to make greater sacrifices in resisting those parliamentary measures especially contrived to reduce the free-spirited people
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of Massachusetts to the condition of mere subjects to the Crown. The town raised its voice against the passage of the Stamp Act, and joined in the short-lived joy over its repeal, of which event the Sons of Liberty have left a permanent memorial to this day.1 It voted to discourage the use of foreign superfluities and to encourage domestic manufac- tures. It abjured the use of tea, and resolved to unite with other towns for the redress of grievances. In 1774 it resolved not to supply the British troops with any articles but provisions. In September of the same year the delegates from the Suffolk towns assembled here, and organized the convention which made the first declaration of armed resistance to Great Britain. The people opened a subscription for the distressed poor in Boston, " cruelly suffering in the common cause of America." But they did not entirely rely upon resolutions and declarations. In March, 1775, they raised a company of sixty min- ute men, to be drilled three days and a half in each week, to be ready to march on the shortest notice in case of an alarm, and to serve nine months. In all these stirring movements the town was acting in co-operation with the other country towns in the com- mon cause. Such was the preparation made by the men of Dedham for the conflict which they clearly foresaw was about to open. Knowing as we do the spirit that animated them, their complete readi- ness for any emergency, and informed by subsequent
1 " The Pillar of Liberty."
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events, we may feel assured that if, on the morning of April 19, 1775, a detachment of British grenadiers had marched up the High Street of Dedham with a hostile purpose, the minute men of Dedham would have been found on yonder Common, to make their stand for the common cause of home-rule and self- government. But, as has been aptly said, the "lot of glory fell to Lexington."
A little after nine o'clock in the morning, there came a horseman down the Needham road to bring the Lexington alarm. The minute men were ready for the expected summons, and knew just what to do. There are traditions still kept of the plough being left in the furrow and the cart upon the highway, and the drivers mounting their horses and galloping for their muskets and accoutrements. They did not wait for more than a platoon to as- semble before they started. Captain Joseph Guild, of the minute men, gagged some croaker who had said that the alarm was false. As the day wore on, the militia companies mustered under their respec- tive captains. The first company of the first parish, sixty-seven officers and men, was commanded by Cap- tain Aaron Fuller. A smaller company of seventeen men marched under Lieutenant George Gould. The company of the South Parish, under Captain William Bullard, had sixty officers and men; and the com- pany of the West Parish, thirty-one officers and men, was under Captain William Ellis. The Fourth Parish company, under Captain Ebenezer Battle, marched
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