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 8
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Such, briefly told, is " the history of the Salem witchcraft,"-a sad, sad tale ; one not likely to be repeated in any nation. It has not been without its moral lessons. Let us hope that the memory of those
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
who suffered death as condemned "witches," may remain green in history, as it deserves to do so. The courage that faces the scaffold or the press, rather than confess to an uncommitted sin, is worthy of an epitaph engraved on the hearts of all who follow in the Christian world.
CHAPTER VI.
THE EARLY AND LATER MEANS OF COMMUNICATION AND TRANSPORTA- TION IN AND THROUGH ESSEX COUNTY.
Little less interesting than the actual work itself, is the attempt to re-examine the course of operations, by which any infant colony, set- ting themselves down in the midst of the wilderness, have sought to subdue obstacles, conquer difficulties, and overcome whatever about their situation might stand between them and their comfort. Such warfare against odds unreckoned, may often be with human antagonists ; but more ofteu with the forces of nature, which man in such a position finds, if never before, are not already arranged for his best accommodation and assistance, when he sets himself to civilize the waste.
One of the very earliest forms iu which this opposition of nature is met, is in obstructions to free travel and transportation. Our pro- genitors did not, indeed, as in the tropics, find the exuberance of veg- etation so enormous that their roads and ways must be cleared afresh every week, as sometimes there happens ; they did not find their hab- itable situation reduced to a series of detached valleys, between which irreducible mountains and rocky crags might forever discourage the constructions of the engineer; they did not even find their chosen territory subordinated to the condition of heavy streams, whose swollen waters might spread their banks with annual desolation, nor cast among islands where the only communication was burdened with the dangers of every storm.
But they did find many hindrances of other descriptions; and, if they were not absolutely insuperable and disheartening, they certainly had in them little of encouragement. Before them lay the sea, ill- tempered and turbulent, bounded by off-shore winds, and battering ever at a coast-wall, before which every ship was like matchwood. Behind them was a forest, whose further border no man had seen; and, turn as they would, its thickets met them, inextricable with growth confused, its swamps interrupted them, deep with unmeasured mire ; or its ledges frowned down at them, defying all instruments of attack that they could then employ upon them. Under such circum- stances, it was not strange that they gave first attention, not to the making of roads at all, but to any and all the other arts that more particularly, and more immediately, had to do with the maintenance of life, and the security of property.
Still, as communication of some kind must be had, they availed themselves of the most ready and natural form ; to wit, that by water. From their seaside locations, where, at first, they had planted them- selves, within reach, as it were, of their old English homes, with only a voyage between, - from these they gradually permitted the attrac- tions of better soil or other special advantages, to draw them inland. Yet everything depended on the canoe and its powers for carriage ; and here again nature had met them more than half way. The smooth water of the rivers and the deeper inlets was even better travelling- ground for such small craft than the open sea. There was here less of danger, more of uniformity. And thus the settlements grew and spread inland along the river-margins. More perfectly natural high- ways could not be imagined, than these rivers furnished across the whole territory of the county ; even now, almost the whole system of towns and villages is seen to have been originally fixed and decided by the accommodations they afforded.
The original settlement at Salem found thus an casy extension iu three directions : northward, along Bass River to Beverly and its upper farms ; north-west, by the Essex branch to Danvers Port, and thence to the Plains and Centre ; and westward, by the North River to the "North Fields," and to Peabody. The second settlement, at Lynn, moved slowly up the Saugus River, and established, not only the iron-works, but the several villages that yet maintain the old name of Saugus. Later adventurers, seeking more genial aspects of posi- tion than the bluff's of Cape Ann or the Plum Island sands could fur- nish, saw what they wanted in the islands of the Ipswich River, whose innumerable, well-filled channels were to them as ready highways as the canals of Venice. And even the same slow stream, smooth and unobstructed, invited them inland as far as Topsfield, where, among the hills and meadows that never saw the sea, they might safely moor the canoes that should give them good passage thither in a day. In the same temper, others, paddling up the Parker and Rowley rivers, found virgin fields and homes of happy prospect at Rowley Town, in one case, and at Byfield Parish in the other. And, more than all, and above all, did those who first occupied the green hills of Newbury and the slant embankments of its Port, see before them in the majes- tic Merrimae a grand highway, like another sea engrafted on the first ; and over this they penetrated inland, founding their villages here and there, and bringing their culture and their art deeper and deeper amid the homes of the red men, till they had not only dotted the principal shores all up and down, but driven, beside, their small craft up the Powow to Salisbury, up the Spicket to Methuen, and up the still more fascinating Shawsbeen to Andover with its score of villages.
Only the cause has been mentioned as the common vehicle on these watery ways ; and by this, in all the southern parts of New England, is generally understood, not the " birch," but the " dug-out," formed of the hollowed stem of a single pine. These answered well for the Indian, who, nomadic as he might be, had yet not much of weight or bulk to be carried at once; but the English settler soon needed a higher style and rate of tonnage. And now, as it has been said of the average Greek sailor, that " he can build a whole boat at any time from her keel to her topmast," so the Englishman, who put himself to the settling of this region, knew generally enough to do the same thing, at least up to the fashion of the time. At this late period it may not be easy to decide what special type of boat was most popu- lar with the early people ; but from the universal prevalence of the "dory," on both sides of Cape Ann at this day, and the probability of its holding this place largely by tradition, it seems not unlikely that this flat-bottomed craft, which an ingenious workman, with good boards, can put in fair going order in twenty-four hours, was that which first opened communication round these shores, and penetrated the unexplored intervales of the Ipswich and Merrimae valleys. Nothing slighter, nor much clumsier, could have answered for the removal of all the Colony effects, in 1626, from Gloucester to Salem ; while, by the easy process of lashing two or three together, a deck-load of considerable dimensions could be successfully removed, as was act- ually done with the timber of the planter's house on that occasion.
But the object of the colonists was not so much to rule the waters, as to subdue and put to service the land. Everything could not be done on the river-banks, and a share of land travel became necessary. The little path leading to the distant cornfield, became the prototype of vaster things in the more distant future. From a single track, just passable for a horse and his rider, it spread out in no great while to a double one, over which the oxen might easily travel, with the capa- cious cart that was piled to groaning with manures in spring, with hay in summer, with the crops of autumn, and the icy logs that made the winter's heap of fuel. From merely connecting the fields, the path presently joined to its like, and ran to the farm of some remote neighbor. It was become a bridle road. One after another the little farmsteads among the nooks of the forest opened their grassy lanes upon it, and soon it was a narrow country way, that led from village
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
to village. Yet on it there was little seen of variety. Only the heavy, two-wheeled ox-cart, the universal and approved vehicle of the farmer, or, rarely, the same extended to a four-wheeled wagon, greater in carrying power, but cumbersome to manage, and difficult of repairs, - only these were met going over such roads as these, where all travel else was on foot, or mounted on that inseparable com- panion of man, whether civilized or savage, the horse.
For all strictly passenger travel for years, even among the rich, was by horseback. Every one could ride ; and either sex alike. The light ploughing of the mellower fields was turned over to the horse ; and both here, and where the same useful creature took the lead of the heavy oxen in the breakage of the stiffer sward, did the Yankee boy, "riding horse to plough," learn full familiarity with equestrian attitudes, and become a fearless horseman, whether graceful or other- wise. And not less, in that carly day, did the girl find her education, in part, by the same spirited model. She had a seat at option, the prerogative of queenship and favor; and, both in the saddle guiding her horse as a lady at hawking, and more carelessly perched on her pillion, behind her more stalwart companion, she, in a large part, acquired that spirit of freedom, that quickness of judgment, and con- tempt of danger, that were made such a blessing to the land for two centuries afterward.
For such travel as these methods furnished, the bridle-path was every way sufficient. But little clearing was necessary ; and, unless in rare cases, no grading at all. A small stump, or a slightly pro- jecting rock, could be easily surmounted by the heavy wheel, and the horse cared nothing for it. But before long, the sound of coach- wheels began to be heard. The richer among the colonists remem- bered that the man of wealth at home, always kept his carriage. They would do the same. It might be, at first, only the governor, or some wealthy justice of the quarterly sessions, that appeared behind the glasses, or pulled them down when he went out for an airing ; but even for him and his few fellows in good fortune, there must be better roads provided. The old highway, probably never better than a cartway of the woods, ran from Boston to Salem, by way of Saugus and Lynn, fording Sangus River at the iron-works ; and over this, an carly governor of the Colony set out one morning from " Shawmut," and pushed forward with his horseback train, till, drawing bridle at evening, he sent forward a courier by night, to "Naumkeag," to in- form his expectant host " that, by the good blessing of God, he had then arrived as far as Master Armitage's, in Sangus, and, by the like favor he should hope to be at Nauinkcag by the next day at the same time."
Horseback travel was not, generally speaking, a mode of much rap- idity, or expedition. As wheeled vehicles came more and more into general use, a better, or at least, a quicker transit was attained ; and this, if nothing else, made a necessity for graded road-beds and hard foundations. Thus the highway, gradually improved in structure and condition, was widened and straightened from time to time. By the tinie of the Revolution, good carriage roads ran in direct communica- tion between most of the towns in the county ; and after the humilia- tion at the North Bridge in Salem, the soldiers from the garrison at Marblehead, found a smooth, hard way over which to march home- ward, from Salem to Boston, by the way of Boston Street.
But now the streams, from having been the only medium that per- mitted any communication, became the worst of obstacles to the newer method. Neither had the amount of travel so increased as to demand the building of bridges, nor the constructive skill of the people risen quite to the point of attempting them, so the natural resort for crossing the rivers, where fording was impracticable, was found in the same boats that aforetime had done exclusive service. In this way ferries started into being, and were soon found, here and there, all over the county. The passage of Saugus River, prior to 1639 at any rate, and probably to a large extent afterward, was made by ferriage between Ballard's and Needham's Landings, as they are
now called. Originally, as has been intimated, it was forded above tide-water, a thing always easy to do; and it has been asserted, not without show of probability, that the same was done at the landings above mentioned ; but it is nearly certain, that by 1639, the water, probably deepening annually, had become too wide for such a pas- sage. That year, one Spenser (who is called Garrett Spenser by Judge Newhall, but who signed himself "Jarrard," and was, more likely, named Gerard, or possibly, Jared), was granted the ferry at Lynn for the space of two years, and the fare was fixed at one or two pence per head for passengers, according to circumstances. Very little more can be known about this ferry ; the bridge probably ab- sorbed most of the travel; and, as it cost no tolls, and after a time was made substantial, the ferry fell into disuse, and was discontinued. Mention has been made of a ferry in Lynn kept by Bray Wilkins, but it was probably in Neponset instead.
Three ferries existed at Salem for a considerable period. The most important of them had been in operation from December 21, 1636, running between North Point in Salem, and Cape Ann, or Bass River Side, in Beverly. It used to be leased for the benefit of the grammar-school masters of Salem. Before 1639, it carried passen- gers only ; but by that time, certainly, it was fitted with a horse-boat, and had regulations for the transporting of live-stock and beasts of all descriptions. This ferry subsisted about one hundred and fifty years, or until September 24, 1788, and was then superseded, after great contest between the interest of Salem and Beverly, by the finely built bridge that yet stands in its place. This ferry was granted, in 1639, to one John Dixey, for three years ; but whether this was the same with William Dixey, who was one of the first settlers of Lynn, and afterward returned to Salem, or whether William took another ferry, further up the North River, does not seem well determined.
This secondary crossing, perhaps not much below the site of the present North Bridge, is, on the whole, likely to have been a regular ferry at some time ; but not being in any principal highway, and being of private ownership on both sides, little or no record remains in regard to it. Indeed, it can hardly have been in operation later than 1770, for the North Bridge was built as soon as then, and the ferry to Beverly was then in full activity.
Another ferry long existed between Salem shore, not far from Phil- lips Wharf, and the Marblehead side, near what is called Naugus Head. At that time, the highway from Salem to Marblehead left the former place near the present entrance of the Boston Turnpike, and threading its way along the edge of the Great Pasture, it rounded all the creeks and headings of the Mill-pond, gained the line of the present road not far from the Loring farm, and made a large curve again round the waters of "Forest River." This very cirenitons way left an excellent opportunity for a ferry like the above-described, to do good business ; but before long, the nearer route through the " South Fields" was opened, the tendency of Marblehead settlement to the eastern side of the peninsula was decided, and the utility of that ferry being plainly gone, its practice was given up accordingly.
The breadth and quietness of the Merrimae River, and the number of villages scattered along its banks, made carly inducements for the establishing of numerous ferries between its shores. Two of these were located a little above the Powow River, within the limits of Amesbury. The first was authorized by the General Court, April 29, 1668, the same day of the incorporation of the town. Its location may be fixed, perhaps, by tradition ; but the act did not locate it any further than to place it " about Mr. Goodwin's house," on the Ames- bury side. Where it touched on the other, does not appear. This ferry continued in operation, certainly, up to 1729; for, on the 22d of September, in that year, the town voted to prosecute Capt. Hum- phrey Hook for possession. It hardly seems that they succeeded against him ; as, after a time, March 10, 1734-5, John Badger and others, petitioned for the establishing of a new ferry, at or near " Savage's Rock."
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HISTORY OF ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The passage of the river at points above this, was even earlier at- tempted, than those mentioned. In 1647, a ferry near Haverhill was authorized, to be kept by Thomas Hale ; but the place is not stated. The crossing at "Swett's Ferry" has been stated as established in 1711, but there was certainly an antecedent date; for the town of Newbury granted, March 26, 1694, " that John Kelly, Sr., should have permission to keep a ferry over the Merrimac, at Holt's Rocks, in the place where he now resides." The Swetts, father and son, must have succeeded to this same privilege.
It is said, that by 1745, there were four more lines of ferriage in regular service above Holt's Rocks; viz., Cottle's, at the month of East Meadow River ; Pattee's, near a place formerly of David Nichols ; Milliken's, known as the " Chain Ferry "; and Griffin's, near the cen- tre of Haverhill town. It may be this last that has survived since 1738, not even destroyed by the building of the new bridge almost on the same spot, but carrying passengers statedly, for more than a hundred years regularly, and occasionally, up to 1872. Still above all these, we fiud Gage's Ferry, plying between the shores of Brad- ford and Methuen. It is a little remarkable, as giving a passage over the Merrimac by a line due east and west, which could hardly be else- where done. The historical data of this ferry are not now at hand, but it appears to have been in operation np to 1856, though since then it has been discontinued.
But as the country about the month of the Merrimac was sooner settled than that above, so there was at least one ferry there of prior antiquity. This was at Carr's Island, ahont midway between the two existing bridges. In 1644, a grant was made to Tristram Coffin to keep this ferry on the Newbury side, and the patent was renewed to him as Tristram Coffin, Sr., December 26, 1647. The Salis- bury side of this ferry was kept by George Carr ; aud the whole travel was here monopolized till October 25, 1687, when Andros granted a new patent to Capt. John Marsh, for a new ferry further down the river. The exact location of Capt. Marsh's ferry may not now be known; but it may very likely have been at some point near the present railroad bridge, where it would certainly best accommodate the increasing travel and population.
Most of these ferries were of the simplest kind, carrying little beside foot passengers, or occasionally au equestrian and his beast, and propelled with nothing more than the oar or paddle. This was but an inadequate method, however, as time brought increased neces- sities ; and ferry-boats were soon constructed, to be propelled by horses. Thus, the Beverly Ferry was, by the regulations of 1639, obliged " to keepe an horse-boate." Whether any of the Merrimac ferries employed such, does not appear, but is not unlikely. The one known as Milliken's was also called the " Chain Ferry ; " and this may point to the use of a mode of propulsion specially applied in such cases. A light, strong chain was stretched loosely across the stream, sinking below the draft of ordinary vessels. This ran over a wheel on board the boat, which being turned by the horses, worked the boat backward or forward with great power and facility. There does not appear to have been any ferry in Essex County using the chain method, except the one mentioned ; and we have no certain information as to this case, but only notice its probability.
By a natural, though slightly indirect progress, where ferries were practicable, and by a most immediate step, where they were not, the growing population came to demand the building of bridges over all unfordable streams. And here, copying, doubtless, from the institu- tions of the mother country, the right of the government to authorize and regulate these structures was carly recognized. Yet it seems rather to have been for the adjustment and apportioning of expenses, or for the establishing and regulation of tolls, that the legislative power was invoked ; for where the bridge was small, or the owner- ship beyond question, as must happen in scores of cases. no attempt at chartering was apparently thought of.
Perhaps one of the oldest chartered bridges in the county is that
over Saugus River, on the old highway to Boston. It was first built in 1639. The General Court ordered, June 6, " that those of Lynn shall have 507 from the country toward the building of a cart bridge over the river there ; when the bridge is finished to be allowed them." On petition of the town, October 27, 1648, the Court further ordered, " that there shall from henceforth be allowed thirty shillings per annum ont of the treasury of the county toward the maintenance of the said bridge, for which the inhabitants of Lynn are forever to repair it." This action was probably incited by the heirs of Edmund Ingalls, one of the first settlers of Lynn, who, when the old man was unfortunately drowned by falling through the decayed structure, applied and recovered of the State 1007 for a life-forfeit. The accident happened in March ; and the Court also allowed, on the 23d of that month, 207 more for immediate repairs.
But the General Court seems to have determined that the State should pay no more on that account, and the people of Lynn were not slow to urge their own inability in the case, so that, May 23, 1655, the Court ordered that a committee should rebuild the bridge, and the county court should apportion the expense among the towns in the county, "according to the law made this present session." It was thus made a county charge, and has so remained, save that the joint committee of Lynn and Sangus, settling the mutual affairs on the incorporation of the latter town, agreed that the two towns " shall support said bridge equally, in conjunction with the county." It is matter of curions reminiscence, that this, though certainly not much more than fifty feet long, went for years and years by the name of " Sangus Great Bridge."
Another bridge, probably of even greater antiquity, and surely of greater historic note, is the famous North Bridge in Salem. Unlike the other, it is not a communication between town and town, and hence is wanting in those traits of legislative history that would help us to a knowledge of its very old story ; but it is, and has always been, a cherished object of the people of Salem and vicinity, from the fortunate opportunity it presented Feb. 26, 1775, for the checking of Col. Leslie and his soldiers, when they marched for the destruction of the provincial supplies in "North Fields." It is, no doubt, the earliest instance in the country, or very nearly so, of a bridge built with a draw for the passage of masted vessels.
The South Bridge in Salem is very much later in origin, having been built not far from 1810. It was an essential part of the enter- prise of the great Salem merchant, E. Hersey Derby, who laid ont Lafayette Street, and brought it into the city proper by a straight course, filling up and almost obliterating Peel's Dock, in so doing.
A far more important bridge, both in history and utility, is that connecting Salem and Beverly. The people of the latter town, after some years of experience with the ancient ferry already described, concluded its management to be almost wholly in the interest of Salem, and set themselves to rectify the evil by the substitution of a permanent bridge. This was in 1787. The corporators were partly from each town, and met and organized at the Sun Tavern in Salem, December 13th of the above year. The bridge was at once begun, but was not opened for travel till September 24, 1788. Then every one wondered to see that such a thing could have been done. The whole influence of Salem had been given against the enterprise, even to a definite and emphatic vote of the town ; for it was claimed that there could be no more navigation of North River, and forty vessels, then plying in that water, could enter it no longer. Then, when it was found useless to oppose the bridge any longer, it was threatened to build a parallel one for ruinous competition with it ; and this was so far carried into effect as to produce the erection of what was then and ever since .alled "Spite Bridge," between Danversport and Beverly, by which a shorter and easier route from the western part of Beverly to Salem was indeed secured.
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