USA > Massachusetts > Dukes County > Marthas Vineyard > The history of Martha's Vineyard, Dukes County, Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 44
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The memorial of us the Subscribers inhabitance of Dukes County Humbly Sheweth that we have Laboured under Grate difficulty for sev- eral years past for want of a Stated ferry across the Vineyard Sound which has in a grate Measure deprived us from our equal Comerce with the rest of the Province, and although the Court of General sessions of the peace have offered to State the ferrage both for Men & beasts at a much hire rate than Usule yet Nobody appears to take it, Though Some that live handy to the harbour would willing undertake to keep it upon the
1County Court Records.
2Early History of Falmouth, p. 51.
3County Court Records.
4Ibid. Comp. Douglass, Summary, I, 403.
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terms offered but are not of ability to purchase a boat & other things Seutable for the desine: And therefore your memorelests humbly pray That your Excellency & honours will take the premises under your wise Consideration & pas an Act for the Procuring of a Suitable boat & wharf for the ferry at the publick charge of the Province or County or both, as your Excelency & honours Shall se fit, Or releve us from the difficulty we Labour under by Such other way or meens as your Excellency & honours in your grate wisdom shall Think best, & your Memorialists as in deuty bound shall ever pray.1
The General Court, in answer, passed an act embodying the relief asked for, the text of which is as follows: -
Whereas there is a provision made by Law for the Justices in their Quarter Sessions throughout this Province to License persons to keep ferries & State the fares or prices of each ferry both for man and beast, and to take bond of each ferry-man &c. But no provision is made by Law to enable the Justices in their Sessions to lay a Tax on any County for the Upholding & maintaining of Ferrys either by Building boats, wharfs, ways &c. Where there is no particular person or persons who will be at the cost thereof: By means whereof the S'd County of Dukes County is wholly destitute of a ferry from s'd County (which is an Island), to the main Land wherby many Inconveniences Daily happen to those that have Occasion to go to & from S'd County
Be it therefore Enacted by the Governour, Council & house of repre- sentatives that the Justices of the Court of Gen'l Sessions of the peace at any of their sessions hereafter to be held in & for s'd County of Dukes County are hereby Enabled and Directed to raise monys & to Assess the Inhabitants of said County of Dukes county & their Estates as well for the building of Ferry boats making & maintaining suitable wharfs & ways for s'd ferry ways for the Convenience of keeping a ferry in s'd County in as full & Ample a manner as the Justice in s'd Quarter Sessions are by Law already Enabled to do for Defraying the Necessary repairs of Bridges, prissons. the maintenance of poor prisonners, and all other proper County Charges & under the same regulations & restrictions.2 (April 19th, 1754.)
The ferry was now in the position of an institution re- ceiving state aid, in the form of a subsidy at its establishment, but it continued to be run as a private venture, in so far as the collection of toll was concerned. Even then it does not seem to have become a paying institution, for Elisha West, who was licensed as ferryman in 1756, petitioned the General Court in 1760 for payment of certain ferriage for troops trans- ported, and in it he states that "the Income of our ferry does not pay the Charge of Boats."3
1Mass. Archives, CXXI, 300. It is dated Dec. 1, 1753. 2Ibid., 301.
3Ibid., LXXX, 10.
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In 1758 West's license was enlarged in scope so as to permit him to operate "so far Eastward as Highanes and Westward as Dartmouth and thereabouts in Monument Bay." Upon the expiration of his term he was succeeded by Jonathan Manter, 1761, who held the franchise for ten years. During the Revolution, if is doubtful if there was any regular ferry service owing to the dangers of traffic, and the records are silent on the subject. In 1784 Isaac Daggett was licensed to keep a ferry "to the Continent and Nantucket."
It will not be necessary to follow further in detail the vicissitudes of the ferry from year to year, except as organic changes occur, or new features develop. At some time prior to 1782 a ferry was established between Edgartown and the mainland, according to a visitor to our island at that date. He records that "a good ferry is established between Edgar (town) and Falmouth on the main, the distance being nine miles." It is doubtful if this means the use of Edgartown harbor as the island terminus, as Eastville was then a part of Edgartown, and the landings were probably made at that point for the whole island.1 Ebenezer Smith was appointed to keep the county ferry in 1819, "according to the ancient custom and usages."
THE PACKET SERVICE.
After the close of the Revolutionary war and the develop- ment of the postal facilities by the new government, there came a demand for better transportation service and some regular method of delivering the mails. When this was ac- complished is not definitely known, but probably by 1800 regular boats began to run between New Bedford and the Vineyard, and this also accommodated the neighboring island of Nantucket, to which as early as 1807 the line was extended. Edgartown was the terminus for this place, and the service was, it is believed, tri-weekly, the schooners taking the course through Quick's Hole into Buzzards Bay.2
In 1837 there was daily service of this line between New Bedford and Edgartown, which could only have been accom- plished by two boats leaving at the same time, one from each
1Crevecoeur, Lettres d'un Cultivateur Americain, p. 159. There is no reference to it in the County Records.
2Kendall, " Travels," II, 199, 200.
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place.1 The name of the first boat or the order of their runs on the route are not definitely known, and the most that can now be said is to give a list of the vessels which plied between the Vineyard and the mainland. The earliest known boat is the sloop Ann Eliza, Capt. John Merry, followed by the Eclipse, Capt. William Harding; Oliver Cromwell, Capt. Samuel Cromwell; Hero, Capt. Caleb Thaxter; Amethyst, Capt. William Harding, Jr .; Passport, Capt. Holmes W. Smith; Escort, Capt. H. L. Cleveland; a second Passport, Capt. Frank Pease; schooner Independence, Capt. Grafton L. Daggett; Helen Snow, Capt. H. L. Cleveland; Abby B, Capt. Grafton L. Daggett. These boats carried both freight and passengers, and made such trips as could be made depending upon weather conditions, but it was a pretty hard storm which could keep them in port on Saturdays, when the homeward trip was due.
THE STEAMBOAT SERVICE.
When the first boat with steam power began to operate a stated service between the Vineyard and the mainland is not known, and being a private enterprise no records are left to tell the tale. That it began somewhere in the "thirties" is the testimony of those having recollections of the matter, and the first boat was called the Marco Bozzaris, commanded by Captain Barker, which made the run to and from New Bedford and Edgartown, touching at Homes Hole. She was followed by the Telegraph, with the same commander, and it should be said that Nantucket was made a part of the route of these steamers, the Vineyard being an intermediate port of call, as now. The next in point of sequence was the Massachusetts, Capt. Lot Phinney, master, which had the same run for a period, but later dropped Edgartown and only stopped at Homes Hole on her way between Nantucket and New Bedford. Passengers from Edgartown made connections with the boat by stages run by John Pease and J. A. Baylies. The next steamer was the George Law, and she was soon followed by the Naushon, built under the superintendence of the late Capt. Holmes W. Smith, for the run between the Vineyard and New Bedford, and she became a rival of the Massachusetts, which was kept for the Nantucket service.2 The Naushon was a
'Devens, " Sketches of Martha's Vineyard, etc.," p. 9.
2The Nantucket and Cape Cod Steamboat Co. was first organized to run between Nantucket and Hyannis.
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FSC EAGLE 000
HAMILTON
. @ TELECKAPH
THREE EARLIEST STEAM PACKETS VINEYARD-NANTUCKET ROUTE 1818-1833
From "The Story of the Island Steamers." By permission of H. B. Turner.
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fast boat, and such was the rivalry of the two interests, that her captain had no regular times of leaving the Vineyard, but would wait till the Massachusetts hove in sight, and when she got about up to Hawes Shoal the Naushon would steam out and run for the wharf at Homes Hole to pick up the passen- gers ahead of the rival, and generally did the trick. The Nantucketers called the Edgartowners "Old Town Turkies," an allusion to the frequency of herrings in the diet of the people of Edgartown, and the Nantucketers were called "Scraps" on account of the whaling phrase "blubber scraps." One day, as was the custom, a race was on between the two down from New Bedford, and the Massachusetts burnt tar to force speed, but the Naushon passed her rival as they rounded East Chop, and the steward of the latter hoisted a herring on a pole as a pennant of victory.1 The next steamer was the Metacomet, a new boat one hundred and seventy feet long and of three hundred and ninety-five tons burthen, and she arrived in Edgartown harbor for the first time on Sept. 28, 1854, under the command of Capt. Benjamin Simmons. It does not appear that she continued long on this route as she was not in service after 1856, and her place was probably taken by the Canonicus, which is the next in point of time to make the run to the Vineyard. How long she remained in service is not known to the author, but she soon had a sister boat to take care of the growing traffic. The Eagle's Wing was built in 1854, of four hundred tons burthen, at a cost of $52,000, and was at once placed on this route as an alternate boat with the Canonicus and Metacomet. She was under the command of the late Capt. Benjamin C. Cromwell, and made tri-weekly trips between New Bedford and the Vineyard, leaving Edgar- town on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at 9 A.M. She continued in service until burned in Providence river July 24, 1861, and a new boat was immediately provided for to ac- commodate increasing travel. This new boat was named the Monohansett, after one of the small islands in the Elizabeth group, and her name awakens in every Vineyarder affectionate recollections of a staunch craft that carried thousands of our island people to and fro in their journeys without a mishap. The steamer Monohansett was built at the yard of Thomas Collier in New York for what is now the New Bedford, Mar-
'The Naushon was sold to the New York Herald about 1848 and renamed the Newsboy.
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tha's Vineyard & Nantucket Steamboat Company. She was begun in January, 1862, and finished in May of the same year, the work being carried on under the supervision of Capt. Benjamin C. Cromwell of Vineyard Haven, her designer. Her dimensions were: length, 182 feet; beam, 28 feet; depth nine feet six inches; her registered tonnage, 489 gross.
The Monohansett took her place on the Vineyard route in the summer of 1862, and made her first trip to Edgartown June 1. August 13 she was chartered by the United States for thirty-five days for $500 a day. October I she returned to these waters and resumed her place on the Vineyard route, remaining until Aug. 23, 1863, when she was again chartered to the government for service in the department of the South. She was used on the Potomac, carried troops to Newbern and Hilton Head in the Carolinas, plied on the James river, and from August, 1864, until the close of the war was headquarters boat at City Point. During that period she was used by General Grant as a dispatch boat. In the summer of 1874, when Grant, then president, made his visit to our island, it was the Monohansett which carried him up from Cottage City. Since the war, the Monohansett spent most of her time on the Vineyard route, although at different periods she plied between Boston and Provincetown, Plymouth and Marblehead; carried excursionists from Harlem to Coney Island and Rock- away, and ran between Greenport, Long Island, and New London.
Her home was, however, on the route for which she was designed, and when in 1901, she was sold to do duty in her old age in alien waters, she promptly ran ashore and died of a broken back and doubtless a broken heart. Every islander, who has at some time in his life been carried to the Vineyard in this famous craft, will be glad to look upon the picture of the old Monohansett as she appeared when she made her last trip on this route. Hundreds greeted her as she swung out for the last time from the wharves of Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, and Vineyard Haven.
Increase of travel, especially in the summer season, as the Vineyard came to be known as a resort, necessitated ad- ditional transportation facilities, and the Martha's Vineyard, 515 tons, built in Brooklyn in 1871, came on this route. She alternated with the Monohansett until 1886, when the further demands of the traveling public required another steamer to care for the growing summer traffic. The Nantucket was
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1
NONOHANSETT.
MONOHANJETT
STEAMER "MONOHANSETT " ON HER LAST TRIP WEST CHOP IN THE DISTANCE
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built that year in Wilmington, Delaware, of 629 tons burthen, and was operated in conjunction with the older vessels. In 1891, another boat was added to the line, called the Gay Head, still larger, being of 701 tons burthen, and built in Philadelphia. She has been used almost exclusively for the summer business of the company. The latest addition is the Uncatena, of 652 tons burthen, built at Wilmington in 1902, and named for one of the islands of the Elizabeth group. These last four named are now in active service throughout the year, according to the requirements of summer and winter travel, on the old packet route between the Vineyard and New Bedford, and extending to our neighboring island. The regular trips are daily round trips between Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, Vineyard Haven, and New Bedford, while the summer season brings all the vessels into service to fill a schedule which calls for four trips each day between the points mentioned.
For a number of years, about 1890-2, a small steamer was chartered each summer to run between Vineyard Haven, West Chop, and Woods Hole, to accommodate the local travel at those points, but the plan was abandoned after several years' trial. This, however, is the natural route of travel from the Vineyard to the mainland, and this short and easy trip will be, without doubt, the next step in the development of travel facilities for the population of this island, a return to the first plan of Isaac Chase, the original ferryman of the Vineyard.
STEAM RAILROAD.
This subject would not be complete without reference to our only railroad, though now but two lines of rust indicate its location and existence. It was built as a feeder for the Old Colony Railroad Co., and was laid from Oak Bluffs wharf to Edgartown village and thence on to Katama. The first train of cars drawn by a locomotive was run over this road Aug. 22, 1874, and it was in operation for about fifteen years. It was then abandoned, and the right of way and property has been sold.
COUNTY HIGHWAYS.
Travel between the towns, as population increased and new settlements developed, required the establishment of roads throughout the island under the jurisdiction of the county authorities. The contour of the island and the lay
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of the towns made it necessary to establish three great high- ways to connect the settlements of Edgartown, Tisbury, and Homes Hole.
The first road to be laid out or traveled was the "Mill Path" connecting the settlement at Great Harbor with the mill set up on the "river" in Takemmy. This path doubt- less followed the old Indian trail between Nunnepog and Takemmy, skirting the heads of the inlets on the south shore. This "path" was probably in existence long before the pur- chase of the four associates in 1669, and is the oldest county highway on the island. It did not follow originally the exact line of the present road, which was laid out in the last century, but ran the same course substantially. The continuation of it beyond old Mill River to the "School House Path" of early times, and the south road in Chilmark, makes the high- way of travel from Edgartown to Gay Head.
The "Old Town" or "Ferry" road from Edgartown to Homes Hole came into existence in 1700 as a result of a presentment by the Grand Jury indicting the county for neglect to provide a way. The court record reads as follows:
Ordered that whereas the grand jury hath presented this County for want of a convenient Roade from Edgartown to The fery at homes hole the Court appoynt Left Isaac Chase and Left Samuell Sarson to view and consider where there may be a convenient way layd out to sd homses hole and make return to the Court to be holden in March next.1
Some sort of a road was then laid out, probably a cart path staked off and cleared.
In October, 1760, in response to "sundry requests," a committee was appointed to investigate the condition of this highway, and on Jan. 20, 1773, a committee of five, ap- pointed by the Court of Common Pleas, made report of a new survey and layout of this old road.2
The "Homes Hole Road" designates an old county highway leading from West Tisbury to Homes Hole. It was scarcely more than a "path" for carts, and is first men- tioned in 1701, though it had been existing, probably, from the date of settlement of West Tisbury. The exact course of it cannot be determined, as there never was an official sur- vey, but it followed in a general direction the road which now leads from West Tisbury, through Middletown to Lam-
1Dated Oct. 1, 1700. Court Records, Vol. I.
2Ibid., C. C. P., under date above given.
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bert's Cove, thence across the Chickemmoo region to the existing state highway, west of the head of Tashmoo. In December, 1770, a number of the inhabitants of Tisbury petitioned for the official layout and acceptance of this road. The recently constructed state highway connecting Tisbury, West Tisbury and Chilmark follows, in part, the old roads laid out two centuries ago between these towns.
OLD TAVERN DAYS ON THE VINEYARD.
Whoe'er has travelled life's dull round Where e'er his stages may have been May sigh to think he still has found The warmest welcome at an inn. Shenstone.
Under the colonial laws of Massachusetts each town was obliged to keep a "house of entertainment" for the convenience of strangers, and in 1656 each town was made liable for not keeping an "ordinary," as taverns were called in those days. The Vineyard, being a practically independent political colony until it came under the jurisdiction of New York, was not sub- ject to this law of the Massachusetts colony, yet our island more nearly reflected the customs and spirit of Puritan Massa- chusetts than the roystering liberalism of the duke's New York province. Being out of the line of travel, there was not so much demand for public houses on the Vineyard as in towns situated on the king's highways, but when a stranger happened to arrive on the Vineyard the necessity of a tavern for his comfort and entertainment existed in greater relative propor- tion than on the mainland, for his only other resource was to proceed on to Nantucket or retrace his steps to America, unless charitable people opened their private houses and gave him bed and board.1
As years went on intercourse with the Vineyard increased, and travelers came down on horseback from Boston by the old "bay path" through Braintree, Scituate, Plymouth, and Sandwich to Falmouth, and at each town they found a con- venient tavern except at Falmouth. Not until 1665, was the want in the last-named town remedied .? This ordinary was
1Rev. Michael Wigglesworth, in 1653, records in his diary a storm-bound deten- tion at the Vineyard. en route, New London to Boston, and that he found "a safe harbor in friends houses during that long storm."
2On February 7th of that year Mr. Isaac Robinson was licensed to keep an or- dinary in Falmouth.
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probably located at or near Wood's Hole, the landing-place for the ferry which plied between the Vineyard and the Cape. The frequent and natural choice of the locations of a tavern was at a ferry landing, and usually one person combined the duties of ferryman and innkeeper.
The first record of any legislation regarding taverns on the Vineyard is found in the "General Laws," made at the first General Court held at Edgartown, June 18, 1672, after the island had become a part of the duke's New York govern- ment. The following is the law: -
Any Quarter Court shall have Power to Grant License unto such as they shall think fitt to keep a House of Publick Entertainment, to sell Liquor, Wine, Beer or any like Strong Drink by Retail with such Limita- tion and Custom as to such court shall think meet.
The license to keep an ordinary did not carry with it the permission to sell "strong drink," and a separate one was required for that purpose. It is needless to add that the inn- keeper provided himself with this valuable authority to fur- nish entertainment for his guests. This often resulted in disorderly occurrences in the tap rooms of the taverns, and on Oct. 28, 1675, the Quarter Court found it necessary to pass a law covering promiscuous sale of strong drink in these public houses. It reads thus: -
If any person shall be found in drinke at any publique House of entertainment, if the master of such house cannot make it appear that such person had not the drinke at their house he shall be fined ten shillings. to the treasurie.
Special laws were also made regarding the sale of strong drink to the Indians, the penalty for which was made suffi- ciently large to act as a restraining influence against this traffic. Many, however, could not resist the temptation of profit, and the early court records abound in frequent entries of the infliction of the penalty on those who transgressed the statu- tory enactment.
Not all the towns availed themselves of the privilege of a licensed inn, however, for in 1692 we read that "some Towns thinck it inconvenient to have such houses," a condition which prevailed in Chilmark, for example, and provisions for the sale of liquor by private persons was made in consequence.
It is probable that the early taverns of the Vineyard were not houses specially constructed for that use, but were the
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dwelling houses of the owners, of which a spare room or two were available for the transient guest, with probably an ad- joining building or "leanto" used as a store and tap room where the guests could sit on the "bench" and smoke, drink, and play cards, and hear the village gossip from the convivial patrons of this portion of the ordinary, who resorted there nightly for these comforts and consolations,
"Where graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired."1
It is doubtful if any of them were distinguished by such pic- turesque and fanciful names as were applied to many of the
2
LODGINGS
JOSEPH CLAGHORN'S TAVERN SIGN, HOMES HOLE. 1792
early colonial taverns, a custom derived from our English progenitors. It would be interesting to know that Chase's ferry tavern was called the Quaker's Hat, that Cathcart's was the Beehive, or that Worth's was the Spouting Whale, but it is safe to infer that they were simply known as "Chase's," "Cathcart's," and "Worth's."
1In 1783, either in a burst of official activity or a wave of morality, nearly all of the innkeepers on the island were "pulled" with many of their guests for permitting and playing "at an unlawful game with cards;" but each indictment was quashed, and that ended the raid on our taverns.
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The taverns had in them much of that on which we can dwell with affectionate interest. The convivial phase was only incidental to their better features. They were always provided with a latch-string hung out for every belated traveler. "A house of sin, you may call it," says old Bishop Earle, "but not a house of darkness, for the candles are never out." The sentimental memories which cluster around these historic inns is rather one of good cheer, warm hospitality, and a mug of hot flip as a fitting close to a day's sojourn with Widow Chase at Homes Hole or Widow Sarson at Edgartown.
Many of the picturesque features of the taverns on the mainland which were situated on the great highways of travel were lacking to the hostelries of the Vineyard. No stage coaches drawn by four horses came dashing up the road to crack of whip and sound of horn, reining up in front to leave letters and passengers, exchange horses for the next lap in the route, and to patronize the table and tap room. But what they lacked in the romantic they made up in the comforts so grateful to travelers. We can picture to ourselves the clean- sanded floor of the living room, and the chamber with its high "four poster," the feather bed with snowy linen, clean, but oh so cold! pillows of down, counterpane of blue and white, all crowned with curtains of dimity or the more pretentious damask. But they are all gone. The past holds them in scant and loosening grasp. With them went the landlord of song and story. He deserves more than can be said of him here and now, but we will close the scene with his last encomium, the epitaph, as it was written of John Doggett, a native of the Vineyard, who dispensed tavern hospitality in his later days.
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