USA > Massachusetts > Dukes County > Marthas Vineyard > The history of Martha's Vineyard, Dukes County, Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 28
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to see if the Town will agree to Remonstrate against the Petition of Thomas Cooke & Cornelius Merchants Esqr a Committe appointed by the Honourable Court of general sessions of this county, to Petetion the General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to all the Term of P. Court now holden in Tisbury on the last Tuesday of october and ordain that that the same should be holden at Edgartown, The Freeholders &c being assembled they did then proceed to the choice of a Moderator when John Davis was chosen, then proceeded to choose a Committe when the select men of the Town Vizt.
Ezekiel Luce
John Davis were chosen a committe to report at the Represen-
Thos. Dunham tative meeting.3
The two latter named selectmen produced the following document which was adopted by the town as its protest: -
To the Honourable the Senate and House of Representatives of the commonwealth of Massachusetts in General Court assembled
The Remonstrance of your petitioners Inhabitants of the Town of Tisbury in the County of Dukes County, Humbly [sheweth] that at a legal meeting warned for that purpose in the Town of Tisbury on the sixth day of April A. D. 1807. And continued by adjournment to the fourth day May following, the Inhabitants beg leave to Remonstrate against the petition of Cornelius Marchant and others of the Honourable Justices of the court of common pleas & General Sessions of the Peace for the county aforesaid in Removing said Courts from the Town of Tisbury to the Town of Edgartown, which deprives the people of the Sd Town of Tisbury of a Priveledge which we think belongs to us the Remonstrants, Said Town being the Central Town in the County, for one session is holden at Edgarton and to remove the other to the Town of Edgartown will be laying a burden on the people of the Town of Tisbury, for most of the Inhabitants live at a distance of nearly Ten miles from the Court house at Edgartown and wee shall be under many Inconveniencys to at- tend court twice a year at Edgartown, if our Honourable Court had Pe- titioned to hold but one session a year it would have lessened our expences (as lately we have had more Justices in the Commission of peace than at
1Mass. Archives. 2Edgartown Records, II, 139. 3Tisbury Records, 333.
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any former period since the Constitution was framed, and we Should not complain for our county is very small, not larger than many Towns in this Commonwealth, but to remove the other sessions and to hold both at Edgartown will enhance our expences and Travail, so under the existing circumstances that we feel confident that your Honours will not permit the court to be altered from Tisbury to Edgartown. And we beg leave to refer your Honours for the foregoing statement, to the map the census of the County of Dukes County, and the Tax bill, Wherefore your Re- monstrants Humbly pray and expect that your Honourable body will not remove said court from Tisbury to Edgartown where it is now held, and your Remonstrants as in Duty will ever pray,
THOMAS DUNHAM \ Committee appointed JOHN DAVIS by the Town 1
Hearings were held on the petition and remonstrance, but no change was recommended to the Legislature.
By the statutes of the Commonwealth, as existing June I, 1807, the Courts of Common Pleas and Sessions were holden at Edgartown on the third Tuesday of May, and at Tisbury on the last Tuesday of October annually. On the 21st of June, 18II, a law was passed establishing six jurisdictions of circuit courts, excepting Dukes and Nantucket Counties, and it was provided that sessions of the courts should be held as then regulated by existing statutes. This left the former situa- tion untouched in this county, but on June 13, 1814, these two counties were annexed to the so-called Southern Circuit, and by section three of that act "all acts and parts of acts estab- lishing Courts of Common Pleas within and for the counties of Nantucket and Dukes County" were repealed, and it was further provided that the sessions of the courts should be held on the last Mondays of May and September at Edgartown, for this county. On Feb. 20, 1819, these two counties were again excepted in an act to establish courts of sessions in the Commonwealth. Out of all this confusion, and while the succeeding changes were following each other in unusual rap- idity, Tisbury lost its semi-annual session, perhaps by intent and possibly by accident, but if any watchful representative from Edgartown was doing his duty at that time, the omission may not have been so accidental or innocent as might seem. It is evident that great confusion existed in the judicial system of the Commonwealth at that period, to judge from the frequent acts and repeals of acts, but it was a fixed belief of the people of Tisbury that the court had been stolen from them, by under- handed means, if we may trust the traditions of this controversy.
'Tisbury Records, 334. The court records show the last session of the court as holden at Tisbury in October, 1807.
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County of Dukes County
It would be interesting to know the inside history of this phase of the long struggle, but perhaps it has never been handed down to posterity.
It took four acts, finally, in 1826, February, 1827, and June, 1827, and in 1828, before the tangle was straightened out as far as the holding of court at Edgartown was concerned, and in this last act Edgartown was made the county seat, "all laws to the contrary notwithstanding." Matters remained in abeyance for the next thirty years, when the county build- ings at Edgartown, built from 1803 to 1825, the court house and jail, were in a dilapidated state, and the question of re- newal was agitated by the taxpayers of the county. This was always a ticklish time for the fortunes of Edgartown, and agitation again filled the air for a change of the shire town.
The old court house became unfit for occupancy twenty years after the removal in 1781, and in 1803 upon represen- tation of this subject the Justices appointed Thomas Cooke, Benjamin Allen, and Zebulon Allen a committee to consider and report upon the cost of a new building. The sum of five hundred dollars was reported as necessary for the purpose, which the Court approved, and ordered the same committee to "fix upon a suitable lot for the same, and commissioned William Jernegan to sell the old building and procure materials to erect a new one, (36 by 26) on land belonging to James Coffin. This gentleman for "Good will and Regard" for the people of Dukes, County donated on Nov. 18, 1803, the tract of land on Main Street on which the present Court House now stands. The Court allowed the sum of $614.31 to William Jernegan for the cost of the new building in February, 1808, which would indicate its completion about that time. In the previous November, John Davis, Esq., had been appointed agent "to sell and Dispose of the Court House in Tisbury with the Land Belonging to said Court House at Private sale to the Best advantage."
In August, 1857, James Gray, of Tisbury, with others petitioned the selectmen to call a meeting of the voters, to see what action should be taken in the matter of repairing the old county building at Edgartown, and another fight for the cap- ture of the shire town was inaugurated. The meeting was called for the 17th of August, and Thomas Bradley and James Gray were made agents of the town "in relation to County Buildings and having Tisbury to be made the shire Town." Meanwhile, petitions were circulated through the three towns
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praying that the change be made as indicated. The following is a copy of the petition : -
To the Honourable Senate and House of Representatives of Massa- chusetts, in General Court assembled:
The undersigned, legal voters of the town of Tisbury (Edgartown and Chilmark), respectfully represent, that under the existing laws the public buildings and Courts of the County of Dukes County are in Edgar- town, at the extreme end of the County, causing great inconvenience to the largest portion of the inhabitants of the County, and that the County buildings now standing in Edgartown, have become old and very unsuit- able; new buildings must soon be erected, and the cost of changing the shiretown will be no additional expense to the county.
Your petitioners further represent, that Tisbury is the center town of the three towns comprising the County, and that a far greater portion of the inhabitants of the County, and others having business in the Courts and with the records of the County, would have easier access to them if the County buildings were placed in Tisbury.
In view of the above statement of facts, your petitioners respectfully but earnestly request that an Act of your body may be passed making Tisbury the shire town of the County of Dukes County and that the County building be located and courts held in that part of Tisbury called Homes Hole.1
The three petitions were identical in language and were signed by Charles Bradley and 301 others in Tisbury, Charles Kidder and 28 others in Edgartown, and David L. Adams and 100 others in Chilmark, a total of 432 voters in the entire county. This time Homes Hole was the candidate for the honors.
The county commissioners, three in number, were divided, the majority favoring removal to Tisbury, and the movement was gaining in favor with the continued discussion. The Supreme Court was appealed to by the office-holding element of Edgartown, and a Writ of Mandamus was obtained, direct- ing the county commissioners to build a suitable court house and other county buildings, and there was no other alternative but to proceed upon that basis. Specifications and proposals were issued and the contract for the new, and present, county building was let on March 24, 1858, and work was at once be- gun on the new structures. Meanwhile, the petition of the taxpayers were making unsatisfactory progress, and the up- shot of the agitation was that the petitioners got the fatal "leave to withdraw." They were too late in their campaign, as the legislature was faced with the mandamus of the court, and felt it could not, or should not, interfere.
1Tisbury Records, 732-4.
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Nearly a generation grew up, before another similar con- dition presented itself to the people, the need of expensive re- pairs on the court house to make it fit for the uses of courts and the proper transaction of business. Again the ticklish period for Edgartown arrived, and the other towns, practised in this method of attack, began another campaign to have the old buildings abandoned, and the new ones erected at Vine- yard Haven. A site was offered for it in that village, and all the towns joined Tisbury in the petition for a change of the shire town. Committees representing each town besieged the General Court in the early spring of 1896, and the fight waxed hot and acrimonious. Tisbury having one of its citizens re- presenting the Cape District in the Senate, was able to carry that body for the bill, but the measure failed in the House. This was largely due, it is thought, to the heroic measures of Edgartown to save its long primacy. The town unanimously voted to pay for the entire cost of the repairs and improve- ments to the county buildings, and a special bill to authorize her to do this was introduced into the midst of the contention, and at her own expense the day was saved for the old shire town. The General Court passed an enabling act to allow taxation for this purpose, and the contemplated additions and improvements were honorably completed by her in 1897, pro- viding a commodious building containing besides the court rooms, jury rooms, the several county offices, vaults for the preservation of records, a fine library room for the reception of law books for the use of the officers of the courts and the bar. Thus again the ghost was laid, and peace has happily settled down upon the ancient and picturesque shire town. Will another generation witness the regular contest when these buildings shall have grown into the need of renewal?
The following amusing tradition is related in connection with the voting of the towns, probably in 1807, on the question of a removal of the county seat. Extraordinary means were taken to get out a full vote in Edgartown, and the sailing of ships was delayed for weeks so that their crews might vote, and on the day of the town meeting, it was found that it was a close contest between the two factions. Some one suggested that there were several voters who were unfortunately deprived of their liberty, and were languishing in the town gaol opposite, and if the jailer would kindly allow them to step across the street and permit them to vote, it would consume but a few minutes of the time the prisoners owed to the county. The
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jailer did not feel that he had the right to allow a general jail delivery, even for such a worthy object, though it might save the day for Edgartown. It was then proposed that the ballot box be carried over to the gentlemen who were incarcerated, and thus give them the privilege of freemen. The point of order was raised that all ballots must be cast in open meeting, and in the presence of the election officials. Astute minds found a way out of this awkward dilemma, and a motion was made and carried that the meeting adjourn to the jail, where the ballot box was passed along the door of each prisoner's compartment, and the worthy voters reached through the bars and deposited their ballots.
THE COUNTY JAIL.
Under the obolescent form of spelling this word gaol and goal, there are a sufficient number of references in the records to the early existence of a place for the detention of criminals to enable us to learn of its origin and history. What is probably the first allusion to it may be found in the following extract from the records of the General Court: -
It is ordered by the Court in case there be not a sufficient prison built in Edgartown, on Martha's Vineyard within three months after the date hereof, they shall pay a fine of ten pounds.1
This was passed on Sept. 21, 1686, and may have resulted in the erection or purchase of a building for the desired purpose. Possibly the payment of the fine was deemed the lesser burden, as it will appear from a later court order that the county was without a "gaol" in March, 1699. The justices passed the following decree at that term of court: -
Ordered, that whereas grate dammage hath been sustained in this County and greveance to his Majesties Subjects, for defect of a common Goall, that Matthew Mayhew and Benjamin Skiffe Esqrs be desired to agree and covenant for the building of a Common goall to be erected att Edgartown, and that on their information, a county rate be made for payment thereof.2
It is probable that this action resulted in the building of a "Common goall" for Dukes County, but the location of it is not known. A guess may be hazarded that it was located on the common land of the town, though this is scarcely definite
1Nantucket Records, II, 38.
2Dukes County Court Records, Vol. I.
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enough to provoke dissent. The building then erected prob- ably lasted upwards of forty years, until its decayed condition once more made the "common goall" a subject of judicial action. In 1743 John Norton, sheriff of the county, made the following representations to the justices about the dilapidated state of the building: -
To the honourable the Justices of the Court of General Sessions of the Peace for the County of Dukes County, now sitting on the first Tusday of March 1743:
The Petission of John Norton Sheriff of the County of Dukes County Humbly sheweth that whereas I am Sheriff of sd County that I am In duty Bound to Lett your honours Know that I am of the opinion that there is Not a sifficient Prison or Goal In said County, for I am obliged to Put Indain & Inglish Criminells and Debtors and men and women all together and itt is so Rotten that itt is almost Redy to fall down.
I therefore Humbly Desire that your Honours will Take itt Into your wise Consideration and order that there may Be a sufficient and Lawfull Goal or Prison Built as soon as may Be that so the County may not Be Lyable to any Cost, Charge or Damage In Any Respect for want thereof: which is what is offerred from your Humble Servant to Comand.
JOHN NORTON.1
The reference to "Debtors" in this document will recall to mind the practice at that time, under legal statutes, to im- prison persons for debt, unless released by an oath of poverty, known as the "Poor Debtor's oath." The justices took official cognizance of the "Rotten" condition of the jail, and passed the following order in March, 1743: -
Ordered in Court that there be a Prison built in s'd County in the year 1744 of 24 foot long & 12 foot wide & 7 foot stud, well built at the Countys charge & that in order thereunto John Norton Esq to bargain for the same with a Workman to do it or to Enquire & Report to the adjournment of this Court whereabouts the Cost will be in order that money may be raised to Defrey the same.2
According to a contemporary document, dated 1762, this jail had been "lately repaired," and as at that date Tisbury became joint proprietor of the county seat, it is probable that a second building was erected in that town to accommodate prisoners. In 1790 a number of citizens of the county petitioned the General Court that the county be exempted from the necessity of maintaining two jails, and in answer to this, in view of the need of a new jail, the justices of the county
1 Athearn Mss. Library of Congress.
2Dukes County Court Records.
:
*
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History of Martha's Vineyard
were impowered to determine the place where the new building should be erected.1 They decided that "sd Goal be set in Tisbury near the Court House in the land of Mr. Barnard Case adjoining the Northward corner of his orchard facing the Road passing Northward from the sd Court House."
On the survey of 1795 a "gaol" is shown at West Tis- bury, but none at Edgartown, which would indicate the final passing of the one in the latter-named town. When the courts were finally restored to Edgartown about 1825, as pre- viously related, a new jail and a keeper's house were erected, adjoining the court house on Main street, and were occupied as such till about 1874, when they were sold to private parties. The present jail, a two-story wooden building, on the road from Edgartown to Oak Bluffs, was begun in 1873 and com- pleted the next year.
SEAL OF THE COUNTY OF DUKES COUNTY.
In the N. E. Genealogical Register, Vol. XXXVII, 349, appears an article by Abner C. Goodell, Esq., with the title "Provincial Seals in Massachusetts," representing the result of the researches of this gentleman respecting the use of official seals in the various counties of the Commonwealth. In dis- cussing the seals of the county of Dukes County, he uses the following language: "In Dukes County I find occasionally used as a seal of the Probate Court an intricate monogram, the faint and imperfect impressions of which I have been unable to decipher. In 1715 the initials B. S. occur, being evidently those of Benjamin Skiffe, who was then Judge of Probate. Later I find a mitre sometimes used, and sometimes two keys crossed saltierwise among the miscellaneous devices appearing upon the papers of the Probate Court; but no evi- dence that a seal was specially adopted in any of the courts." In a note he suggests that the monogram referred to was a double scroll representing the initials J. A., which were the initials of Jabez Athearn, for a long time clerk of the courts.
The author believes he has discovered the ancient official seal of the county of Dukes County as originally adopted a few years after the settlement of the island of Martha's Vine-
1A whipping-post was in use in Edgartown during the eighteenth century, and frequent references to it occur. There was also a pair of public stocks for various offenders, persons who neglected attendance on church worship or other breaches of the laws of the time. Usually it was an alternate punishment if the fine remained unpaid.
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yard. In Edgartown records, under date of Jan. 22, 1655, appears the following entry: "The common seale of this place shall be a bunch of grapes." The entry above quoted respect- ing the seal undoubtedly applied to the entire island, the "bunch of grapes" being an allusion to the name of Martha's Vineyard, and not to Great Harbor, which was then the name of Edgartown.
While on duty in Washington, the author had an oppor- tunity of consulting a large volume of manuscripts in the cus- tody of the Congressional Library, relating to legal matters upon the Vineyard in the eighteenth century. These manu- scripts, for purposes of reference in this work have been desig- nated as "Athearn Mss.," because they are undoubtedly the original drafts of legal documents and other kindred papers prepared by James and Jabez Athearn in their official capaci- ties as Justices of the Peace and Clerk of the Courts on Martha's Vineyard, beginning about 1720 and covering a period of about twenty-five years. Many of these documents are origi- nals, having signatures and seals, and upon a number of these documents issued by Jabez Athearn as clerk, the author found a curious seal, a representation of which is herewith given. The author took a number of rubbings from them to show the design, and with the aid of a glass copied the design. An examination of the seal, as shown by the engraving herewith, shows that it was probably a rude cutting of the seal adopted in 1655 -"A bunch of grapes." The earliest representation of this seal in the Athearn Mss. is 1722, and from this the drawing was made.
EARLY SEAL OF MARTHA'S VINEYARD, 1655. FROM THE ATHEARN MSS.
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CHAPTER XXI. MILITARY HISTORY, 1645-1775.
THE COLONIAL WARS.
The relations which the Vineyard bore to the various conflicts in which New York, Massachusetts, and the United States have been engaged from the first settlement, with the Indians, the French, the British, and our Civil war, will be considered from the standpoint of the island as a whole, to avoid reduplication in the narration of events in the separate histories of each town. In all the wars which have occurred in the two and a half centuries elapsed since the first settle- ment, the several towns have been represented among the troops despatched to the front by the colonial, provincial, or national authorities, and it is impracticable to assign the in- dividual credits belonging to each. For example, the military companies of Tisbury and Chilmark were united under one organization for many years, and at other times the military command has been combined for the whole island. Soldiers from one town would enlist in another, and the naval or pri- vateering operations during the Revolution comprised seamen taken from all three settlements. For this reason the subject of the external military history of the Vineyard will be treated as a unit. The internal affairs of each town as exemplified in the local militia, during times of peace, as a part of the social annals of each town, will be told separately under their respec- tive heads. In order, therefore, to properly understand the composition of the first military organizations, it will be in- teresting to make a short study of the Puritan militia system, which will serve as a description of the developments of it in each town.
THE PURITAN MILITIA.
The laws and customs of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, from which most of our settlers came, doubtless furnished the basis upon which the miniature army on the Vineyard was recruited, and in the absence of any general statutes on the subject, enacted here, we shall rely on those adopted by the General Court as the model for the organization.
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Military History, 1645-1775
Every male between the ages of sixteen and sixty, able to bear arms, composed the militia force, but like every law, this had its exceptions. Deference was paid to social conditions, and a veneration for the great and the good resulted in ex- emptions of magistrates, schoolmasters, chirurgeons, clergymen, and another class of artisans necessary for the public welfare - millers, herdsmen, masters and crews of vessels in the fishing seasons.
The unit of the military organization was the train band, the officers of which were a captain or leader, ensign, and a company clerk. The honor of an office in the militia was much esteemed. John Hull, treasurer of the colony, a thriv- ing merchant of Boston, was chosen to be a corporal in 1648, and recorded in his diary his praises to God for giving him "acceptance and favor in the eyes of His people, and as a fruit thereof advancement beyond his deserts."1
The militia officers were privileged characters in all the walks of life, and at a time when the colonists were given to the vanities of extravagant apparel they and their families were declared to be exempted from the laws which were directed against excess in dress. The arms of the militia were muskets and pikes, which were supplied by the soldier himself, as his contribution to the general welfare of society.2
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