Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America., Part 3

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett
Number of Pages: 450

USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America. > Part 3

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Quakers, were to be admitted to the saerament of the Lord's supper, and their children to baptism; and liberty of eonseienee was to be allowed those persons who desired to use the book of common prayer, and perform their devotion in the manner established in Eng- land. These direetions of his majesty were not earried into imme- diate effeet. The people met. disenssed the subject, and finally referred the whole matter to the next General Court. In vain did Mr. Norton protest that if the demands of the monarch were not literally complied with, the blood that should be spilt would lie at their door. They told him his mission had been a failure, and so worried him, that he became despondent and melanieholy ; and, being naturally of a sensitive temperament, died soon after.

Rumors now reached England that Goffe and Whalley, the regieides, who had eseaped in vessels to Massachusetts, were at the head of an army, and that the union of the Colonies in 1643 was a war combina- tion got up expressly to throw off their dependence on the mother country. There was no truth whatever in the rumor concerning the fugitive regieides. King Charles II. had previously issued an order for their apprehension, with a mandate to search for them; but, it seems, they had fled to Connectieut, after appearing publiely every- where in Massachusetts - attending meetings on the Sabbath, and on other occasions. - and, on reaching the former Colony, were so effect- ually seereted by their friends, that their place of retreat was never discovered. After living in several places, they finally died in peace in the land of their exile.

The situation of the colonists was now eritieal. Rumors and re- ports, both false and true, had tended to ineense the court of St. James ; and it was even said that royal commissioners were to come over and regulate matters in New England. The colonists aeeord- ingly selected four persons - Bellingham, Leverett, Clark, and John- son - as a commission, instrueting them to retain the patent, and a duplicate of the same, and to keep it safe and seeret for the benefit of the country. Capt. Davenport. who commanded at the Castle, was ordered to report the arrival of any portion of his majesty's fleet, and the people were enjoined to strictly obey the laws. A day of fasting and prayer was appointed, - as usual on all important ocea- sions. - and none but the siek were exempt from publie worship. Even " the mother took with her the nursling whom she could not leave " at home. About an hour before sunset, on the 23d of July, 1664, the principal vessel, the Guinea, of thirty-six guns, followed by three other ships of the line, arrived in Boston harbor. This fleet bore the commissioners, with the king's warrant, and a request to the colonists for aid in reducing the Dutch settlements on the Hudson, for which the vessels were equipped ; and, soon after, the fleet sailed for the New Netherlands. The king's letter was read ; and the sub- jeet debated in the General Court, which sent an able and eloquent reply. sketching the early history of the Colony under the charter from Charles I., and the sufferings and privations endured by the emigrants ; reeiting the encouragements which Charles II. himself had given them, and his assurances of protection ; and stating what had been done to satisfy him of their loyalty, by complying with his requests so far as was consistent with their eharter. It then alluded to the eonduet of those who had for years sought their overthrow, and had set themselves against them by "misinformations, complaints, and solicitations ; " depreeates the commission appointed to interfere, as was apprehended, with their rights, by subjeeting them to the arbitrary power of strangers, proceeding not by any established law, but by their own discretion ; and though the course of the commis- sioners is not specially eensured, yet, say they, " we have had enough to confirm us in our fears."

The reply made to the king by the General Court also appealed to his majesty "to put a stop to these proceedings." and added, in this language : " For if they go on your subjects here will either be forced to seek new dwellings, or sink and faint under intolerable burdens. If the aime should be to gratify some gentlemen by livings and

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

revenues, that will also fail from the poverty of the people. If all the charges of the whole government by the year were put together, and then doubled or trebled, it would not be counted for one of those gentlemen a considerable accommodation. To a coalition in this course the people will never come ; and it will be hard to find another people that will stand under any considerable burden in this country, seeing it is not a country where men ean subsist without hard labor and great frugality. God knows our greatest ambition is to live a quiet life in a corner of the world. We came not into this wildernesse to seck great things to ourselves ; and if any come after us to secke them hecre, they will be disappointed. We keep ourselves within our line, a just dependence upon, and subjection to, your majestic, ac- cording to our charter, it is far from our hearts to disacknowledge. We would gladly do anything within our power to purchase the con- tinnance of your favorable aspect. But it is a great unhappiness to have no testimony of our loyalty offered but this, to yield up our liberties which are far dearer to us than our lives, and which we have willingly ventured our lives, aud passed through many deaths to obtain. It was Job's excellency when he sat as king among his people, that he was a father to the poor. A poor people, destitute of outward favor, wealth, and power, now cry unto their lord the king. May your majestic regard their cause, and maintain their right ; it will stand among the marks of lasting honor to after generations ; and we and ours shall have hearty cause to rejoice that we have been numbered among your majesty's most humble servants and sup- pliants."

With this reply, address letters were sent to the Earls of Claren- don and Manchester, two of the most influential noblemen of the realm, but were not favorably received, the king being "displeased with their petition," while Clarendon expressed amazement that a recall of the commission should be demanded, when the commission- ers had committed no crime, nor exceeded the duties of their office. Three of the commissioners returned to Boston in February, 1665, but their reception was far from cordial. Even the magistrates defied their authority ; and, after a fruitless attempt to revise the laws of the Colony, the commissioners retired, and for a season the contest with the Crown ceased. In the meantime, Gov. Bellingham was chosen to succeed Gov. Endicott, whose death occurred a short time pre- vious. King Charles was too much engrossed with his private affairs to pay much attention to matters of state, and the Colonies flourished in comparative peace.

When forsaking their native land to settle in a wilderness, one declared purpose of theirs was, to propagate the gospel among the ignorant whom they might meet. Allusion was made to this subject in their charter, and the matter was often alluded to in the earlier letters of the company. Several years passed before much was accom- plished. The severity of their trials, with the struggles of the emi- grants for subsistence, and the difficulties met with in their attempts to acquire a new language, were serious obstacles in their path. Yet something had been done towards converting the Indians. Roger Williams had labored by day and by night, from one end of the coun- try to the other, learning a little here and there, of the language of the red men ; striving, almost against hope, for their conversion. Mayhew, the " young New England scholar," preached the gospel to the savages in his wild home on the lonely island of Nantueket, which his father had selected for his abode. To be sure, the scene of his labors was limited to a narrow region ; yet in five years, thirty-nine men, beside women, had joined his meetings ; the next year, the number was increased to one hundred and ninety-nine men, women, and children ; and, in the following year, two hundred and eighty- three persons, exclusive of children, had renounced their false gods ; a school was established, which was attended by thirty children; a town projected, to " carry on things in a eivil and religious way ; " and a covenant of faith had been drawn up and adopted. Mr. May- hew continued his labors, under the auspices of the society formed in

England in 1649, for Propagating the Gospel, " sparing not his body by night nor day ; lodging in their houses, and solving their scruples and objections ; " but business at length calling him to cross the Atlantic, the vessel in which he sailed was lost, and he " ended his days, and finished his work."

John Eliot, of Roxbury, better known as the " Apostle to the Indians," began his work, assisted by his pious and constant com- panion, Gookin, with a firm belief that the Indians must be civilized before they could be christianized; and all his earlier efforts were directed to this end. He preached his first sermon in October, 1646, on an elevated piece of land near Newton Corner, afterwards called by the Indian name " Nonantum," or "the place of rejoicing." His labors were afterwards continued at Concord, Neponset, and in many other Colonial towns ; and the people of Dedham were induced by Mr. Eliot to grant a township of nearly six thousand acres, where the Praying Indians, as they were called, were gathered. This, founded in 1650, was afterwards called Natick, or " the place of hills." In the meantime, Mr. Winslow, agent of the Colony in England, had succeeded in obtaining funds from pious people in that country, and soon a sum, yielding six hundred pounds a year was raised, and the proceeds regularly forwarded to purchase clothing, educate children, publish books, and maintain teachers for the mission ; and by these means was the gospel propagated by the labors of the society before alluded to. The Indians began to forsake their former habits, and to dress like the English ; to engage in agricultural pursuits ; to build better houses ; to catechise their children, and open schools for their instruction ; to pray in their families morning and evening, and give thanks at their meals ; to sanctify the Sabbath, and imitate the Eng- lish generally. Much difficulty was experienced in instilling fixed habits of sobriety and industry, the seeds of indolence seeming to be too deeply rooted to be wholly eradicated.

But the labors of Eliot did not end here. He prepared a gram- mar, catechisms, a primer, a psalter, and finally completed the herculean task of translating the Bible into the dialect of the Indians ; all of which works, - now extremely rare, - were highly esteemed by our Puritan fathers, and were printed at the expense of the Society for Propagating the Gospel. Even in old age, he abated not his labors. In 1661, an Indian college, with accommodations for twenty scholars, was erected at Cambridge, and before long, fourteen praying towns, so called, were settled; two Indian churches were established, connected with which were eleven hundred persons, "yielding obedience to the gospel." The war with Philip, which occurred soon after, proved a serious interruption to the work. There were, of course, not wanting those who doubted the success of the enterprise, while others openly condemned it. Says an able writer on this subject : " If the value of an enterprise is to be mncas- ured by its success, the conversion of the Indians must be regarded as a failure. The race itself has dwindled away, leaving behind few tokens of its presence in the country; and nearly all that remains to remind ns of the genius and exertions of Eliot, are the few scattered books which have descended to us from the past, as unintelligible as the inscriptions upon the obelisk of Luxor; yet, like that, they are memorials of the labors of man, and impressive and instructive are the lessons they teach." Yet the Natick church continued many years to maintain its existence ; the town was settled principally by Indians ; a son of Waban, in whose wigwam Mr. Eliot first preached, held the office of "town clerk"; and a succession of pastors conducted services in the rude church of Eliot's day, and those afterwards erected on its site, until the English became most numerous, and an English settlement was incorporated ; but a house of worship still marks the spot where the rude Indian temple stood.

In the Plymouth Colony, success seems also to have attended the missionary labors of Thomas Tupper and Richard Borne, of Sand- wich, and of Mr. Cotton, of Plymouth, who was an assistant in the work. There were twenty places where meetings were held within

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

the Colony, and, although but one church was gathered, having twenty-seven communicants. and bnt ninety persons had been baptized. there were nearly five hundred attendants on public wor- ship; and eleven years later. this number had increased to about fifteen hundred. The record of all these missionary efforts. still remains as a worthy memorial of the piety of our ancestors. The founders of new sects. are not unfrequently characterized by a zeal highly disproportioned to the wisdom necessary to control the same. But it is with sects, as with individuals. - age cools the impetnosity of youthful passions, and the wildest seldom fail to be sobered by its experience, and instructed by its warnings. In a word, the history of enthusiasm is in all ages the same. No wonder that the Quakers. - to whose persecution we have already alluded. - who are now a quiet and peaceable order of Christians. should have been denounced as " fanatics." Of their history. prior to their appearance in New England. it is not necessary to speak at length. The founder of the sect, George Fox. was a native of Drayton, in Leicestershire, and was the son of Christopher Fox, a weaver by profession, and a man of such integrity, that he was called by his neighbors "righteous Christer." From his earliest years. George. the son. was marked by a gravity of deportment unusual in children. At the age of eleven, he "knew pureness and righteousness." and. during his apprenticeship. such was his honesty. that he "never wronged man or woman in all that time, and it was a common saying among peo- ple, if George says verily, there is no altering him." There is an appareut vanity in such statements, coming from the subject himself, and a lack of attention to the scripture command, "Let another's mouth praise thee. and not thine own." But whatever of egotism his journal may display. it is cheerfully admitted that his morals were exemplary, that his piety was fervent, and that he labored sincerely and zealously for what he regarded as the true doctriucs of godliness. Yet his own morals. however pure. did not prevent him from approving acts of his followers of questionable propriety, if not of positive indecency ; nor did the fervency of his piety. how- ever vital. preserve him from the insidious, because imperceptible, delusions to which imaginative and melancholy minds are so often subject. Quakerism. without doubt, had a mission to perform in the world, or it would never have appeared ; and the very suffering's whieli the persecuted sect endured, afford sufficient evidence of Puritan intolerance, and of nameless cruelties practised by those whose minds were now fast becoming poisoned with suspicions of the fidelity of the savages.

Previous to 1675, four powerful tribes of Indians owned land in New England ; and, next to the Pequots, the Narragansetts were the most warlike. Most of the tribes had resisted all efforts to convert them to Christianity. But the Wampanoags had hitherto continued friendly with the colonists, and had kept their treaty of 1621 inviola- ble, not only with Massasoit. but with his son and successor Alexan- der, and also with their new saehem. the brother of Alexander. gen- erally known, from his place of residence, as Philip of Mount Hope. He was an able and a great man. From the moment when the white man landed. he saw that the doom of the Indian was sealed. He had exchanged the rude bow and arrow for the English musket, in the skilful use of which he flattered himself he could drive his foes before him as the wind whirls the leaves of the autumnal forests. Philip of Mount Hope knew that unless the pale-face was expelled, the Indian would be exterminated ; and he was the first to propose an alliance to prevent it. It was about 1670-71 that suspicions of the intentions of Philip began to be excited. Eight years previous he had prom- ised. at Plymouth, to continue in friendship with the English. and to remain faithful to the king and the Colony : but now it was rumored that he was about to violate his pledge. This he promptly denied : and perhaps deceived those who had so often. in trade, dealt nujustly with the aged chief. Several years of quiet followed, during which Philip matured all his plans; and, in 1675, the war commenced.

The proximate eause of it was the murder of one Sausaman, of the Massachusetts tribe. who had been converted to Christianity, and employed as a teacher at Natiek. but who afterwards apostatized, joined Philip, and became his principal counsellor and seeretary. By the exertions of Mr. Eliot he was reelaimed, but was soon after assassinated by three of Philip's mnen. who were afterwards seized, tried by a jury, part of whom were Indians. condemned and executed. Hostilities began at onee, and butcheries followed, in which the say- ages " exercised more than brutish barbarities. - beheading, dismem- bering and mangling" murdered bodies, and exposing them in the most inhuman manner. Details of the various attacks and repulses would scarcely eome within the scope of the present work. It may therefore be found sufficient to state that in all their dealings with the Indians, the colonists experienced many difficulties with Philip. There was a continuous series of meetings for adjustment. followed by fresh rumors of threatened attacks, retreats, and sorties, in which Capt. Benjamin Church. the most famous partisan warrior. perhaps. that Massachusetts produced, took a prominent part. Another out- break of hostilities occurred at the time Swanzey was attacked, when. anticipating all the horrors of war. Maj. Gookin, of Cambridge. received orders to enlist a band of Praying Indians, of whom fifty- two were mustered in, and marched to the relief of that beleagured town, while the country around was scoured unsuccessfully by Mas- sachusetts troops in search of Philip. Under command of Capt Savage, they immediately marched to the Narragansett country, and. being joined by commissioners from Connecticut. a treaty was con- cluded at the point of the sword. signed by four persons as attorneys for the six principal sachems, and hostages were delivered as a pledge of fidelity. Near Brookfield. in the Old Colony, where a high hill arose almost perpendicularly from the road. - the opposite side being skirted by a swamp, - two or three hundred savages, concealed on the heights. attacked the command of Capt. Hutchinson. wounding him severely, and killing eight men. The town itself was fired in several places, and nearly all the dwellings were consumed. One principal building, to which the inhabitants and the soldiers had fled for safety, was besieged ; and for two days the Indians ponred in upon its seventy occupants an incessant volley of musketry. Twice, a large heap of combustibles was placed against it ; but the flames were ex- tinguished by extraordinary efforts. Pieces of cloth, dipped in sul- phur. were fastened to arrow-heads, and shot at the roof to set it on fire. Foiled in these attempts, a cart. filled with burning flax, hay. and other materials, was pushed up to the walls; but this too was quenched by a shower of rain. The scene was terrific. Within were the English, a comparative handful. with women and children hanging around them ; but their courage never quailed. No quarter was offered ; no quarter was asked. At this critical juneture. when eseape seemed hopeless. aid came from Boston. under the command of Maj. Willard, of Marlborough. and Capt. Parker, of Groton ; an engage- ment followed, continuing all night. and. near morning. the Indians. having burned their shelters, retreated to a swamp a few miles dis- tant. where they were joined by Philip and a remnant of his tribe.

Driven to the forests bordering upon the Connecticut River. Philip attacked Hadley, while all the people were at church, and set the town on fire. This occurred on a Fast day. September 1. 1665, and the place was in danger of being destroyed ; but, in the midst of the contest. while the war-whoop was ringing, and just as the Indians were about to triumph, a venerable figure, of commanding aspeet. clad in the fashion of a former generation, with his hair white from age. suddenly appeared, it is stated, and with sword in hand rallied the disordered troops. infused into them fresh courage. and. placing himself at their head. the savages were speedily compelled to retire. At the close of the struggle the visitor vanished as mysteriously as he came. The belief was long cherished that an angel-hand relieved the town ; and years elapsed before it was known that Col. Goffe, who had been a commander in the army of Cromwell's Invincibles, and

HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.

who was then concealed in Hadley, was the one to whom they were indebted for so timely a deliverance. Deerfield was attacked and nearly destroyed by the Indians, on the same day ; and before the middle of that week, Northfield shared a similar fate. In a second attack on Deerfield, a fortnight later, occurred the dreadful scene at Bloody Brook, wherein scarcely a white man escaped. On the 4th of the following month, the savages attacked Springfield, burning upwards of sixty houses. During these four months of war, the col- ouists had acted mainly on the defensive. Now they proposed to push the fighting, and one thousand troops were ordered to be raised without delay, of which Massachusetts furnished the greater part. A winter campaign was proposed, war was declared, and the Massachu- setts troops, under Maj. Appleton. joined by the Plymouth forces, under Maj. Bradford, and later by the Connecticut troops under Maj. Treat, set out for the country of the Narragansetts. Marching all night through the untrodden snow, the army of nearly twelve hun- dred, of whom one hundred and fifty were friendly Indians, reached the edge of the swamp near the Narragansett fort. A bloody strug- gle followed. At length, gaining a shelter in the lower part of the fort, the opposing parties fought desperately, hand to hand. The wigwams were soon set ablaze, and the shouts of battle mingled with the screams of women and children roasting in the flames. The slaughter ceased only at nightfall, when the wretched remnant of Narragansett warriors crept into a neighboring swamp, and the troops returned to headquarters, with a loss of eighty killed, includ- ing some of their best officers, and one hundred and fifty wounded, some of whom were afterwards found frozen stiff, and nearly one- third of the little army were reported unfit for duty.

On the 10th of February, 1676, the Narragansetts and others united with the remnant of Philip's tribe, and attacked the town of Lancaster, setting fire to the houses and capturing or killing those who attempted to escape. Nearly all of the forty-two persons, who sought refuge in the house of Mr. Rowlandson, their pastor, were either wounded or killed. Before the dwelling had burned to the ground, Mrs. Rowlandson was taken prisoner, but treated kindly. She was afterwards exchanged, and wrote an interesting narrative of her captivity. Ten days later, February 21st, the Indians burned half of the houses, and killed twenty of the inhabitants, of Medfield. Weymouth had a similar experience on the 24th ; and, on the 2d of March, Groton was nearly destroyed. In the attack on Northampton the Indians were defeated ; but the saddest calamity which the Plym- outh Colony suffered during the war, occurred on the 26th of the same month. Capt. Pierce, of Scituate, with about seventy men, was crossing the river near Pawtucket Falls, not far from a pass since known as Attleborongh Gore. Here a few Indians made their appear- ance, limping, and running away, as if lame, to deceive the English. The stratagem succeeded in drawing the colonists into the fatal snare, where, fighting like heroes, they were rapidly mowed down between two fires. A hundred Indians were killed, but not one of the Plym- outh troops escaped. The burning of Seekonk and of Providence followed, and the Indians seemed masters of the situation. A coun- cil of war was immediately called, fresh troops were raised, and on the 21st of April occurred the Sudbury fight, one of the most memor- able in the annals of the Massachusetts Colony, whereiu fifteen hun- dred Indian warriors attacked a comparatively small force of English, killing the brave Capt. Wadsworth, of Milton, with most of his men. The success of the Indians, however, was short-lived. Starvation and disease rapidly wasted their miserable ranks, saving many a town from attack, and leading at last to Philip's ruin. Multitudes of his men deserted him, and a "great and notable slaughter was made," while the savages were sunk in slumber in an Indian encampment near the upper falls of the Connecticut. On the 18th of May, in the same year, Capts. Turner and Holyoke, with one hundred and fifty all who fled. men, surprised the sleeping camp, took deliberate aim, and ent down Some were drowned in the river, while others leaped

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Standard history of Essex county, Massachusetts, embracing a history of the county from its first settlement to the present time, with a history and description of its towns and cities. The Most historic county of America., Part 3

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland Publication date: 1878 Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett Number of Pages: 450

Author: Tracy, Cyrus M. (Cyrus Mason), 1824-1891, et al. Edited by H. Wheatland
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Boston, C. F. Jewett
Number of Pages: 450