USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > New Bedford > The history of New Bedford, Bristol County, Massachusetts : including a history of the old township of Dartmouth and the present townships of Westport, Dartmouth, and Fairhaven, from their settlement to the present time > Part 23
USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > Westport > The history of New Bedford, Bristol County, Massachusetts : including a history of the old township of Dartmouth and the present townships of Westport, Dartmouth, and Fairhaven, from their settlement to the present time > Part 23
USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > Dartmouth > The history of New Bedford, Bristol County, Massachusetts : including a history of the old township of Dartmouth and the present townships of Westport, Dartmouth, and Fairhaven, from their settlement to the present time > Part 23
USA > Massachusetts > Bristol County > Fairhaven > The history of New Bedford, Bristol County, Massachusetts : including a history of the old township of Dartmouth and the present townships of Westport, Dartmouth, and Fairhaven, from their settlement to the present time > Part 23
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" Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
An Act to establish the Town of Fair Haven.
SECT. 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, That the easterly part of New Bedford, in the County of Bristol, as des scribed within the following bounds, with the inhab- itants thereon, be, and they are hereby incorporated into a seperate town by the name of Fairhaven, viz .: beginning at the mouth of Accushnet river ; thence northerly, by sª river, untill it comes to the north side of a bridge at the head of sª river; thence westerly, by the north side of the highway, to Swift's Corner, (so called ;) thence northerly, by the easterly side of the highway which leads to Rounsevill's furnace, until it comes to Freetown line; thence easterly, by the line of sª Freetown, till it comes to peaked rock, (so called,) in the north- east corner of the town of New Bedford; thence southerly, by Rochester line, till it comes to Buz- zard's Bay ; thence, by said sª Bay, to the first men-
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tioned bound. And the sd Town of Fairhaven is hereby vested with all the powers, priviledges, rights and immunities, and subject to all the duties and requisitions to which other towns are entitled and subjected by the Constitution and laws of this Commonwealth.
SECT. 2. Be it further enacted, That of all State and County Taxes which shall be levied and required of sª Towns previous to a new valuation, the sd town of Fairhaven shall pay three tenth parts thereof.
SECT. 3. Be it further enacted, That all the ex- penses arising for the support of the poor of said Town of New Bedford, with whom it is now chargeable, together with such poor as have removed out of sd Town prior to this Act of Incorporation, but who may hereafter Lawfully return to said Town for support, shall be divided between the two Towns in proportion to the taxes which they are liable to pay, respectively, according to this act.
SECT. 4. Be it further enacted, That John Hawes, Esq., be, and he is hereby authorized to Issue his warrant, directed to some suitable Inhab- itant of Fairhaven, requiring him to notify and warn the Inhabitants thereof qualified to vote for Town officers, to meet at such convenient time and place as shall be expressed in his sª warrant, to choose such officers as Towns are by law author- ized to choose in the months of March or April, annually. And that the sd John Hawes, Esq., be, and he is hereby authorized and empowered to preside at said meeting during the election of a Moderator, and to exercise all the powers and do all the duties which Town-Clerks by Law have, and do perform in the elections of Moderators of Town meetings.
EB. W. RIPLEY, Speaker. SAMUEL DANA, Pt of the Senate.
COUNCIL CHAMBER, 22d April, 1812.
E. GERRY." Approved.
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Note by John Pickens, Town Clerk of New Bedford: " No doubt the above date ought to be ' 22d February.'"
ACUSHNET.
The orthography of the name of this river is very various as found in the old records: Acoos- net, Cushnet, Acushena, Accushnutt, Acushnett, Acushnet. The latter is now the usual mode of writing the word, and being the most easily written, I have adopted it. The Indians, like the Greeks, used the aspirate, and it is probable that they called it Hacushnet.
The following are the names of the light-houses in Buzzard's Bay: Cuttyhunk, Dumpling Rock, Clark's Point, Palmer's Island, Ned's Point, fixed lights; and Bird Island, revolving.
ADVERTISEMENT FROM THE COLUMBIAN COURIER.
To Caleb Greene, Clerk of the Proprietors of New Bedford Bridge : W E, the subscribers, Proprietors of New Bedford Bridge, request
thou wilt call a special meeting of said Proprietors, as soon as may be, to see if they will authorise the Committee or appoint another Committee with authority to proceed in building the Bridge and com- pleating the same. Also to hear what report their Committee may make relative to the business committed to them.
Also to see what order they will give relative to those persons who are or may be delinquent in paying the sums assessed upon their re- spective shares; and such other business as they may think proper to act upon when met.
WILLIAM ROTCH, JUN., THOMAS ROTCH, THOMAS HAZARD, JUN., PRESERVED FISH, JOSEPH MAXFELD, PELEG HOWLAND, BENJAMIN HILL, ISAAC SHEARMAN,
New Bedford, 12 mo. 24, 1798. EBENEZER PERRY.
In pursuance of the above request, the Proprietors of New Bedford Bridge are hereby notified, that a special meeting of said Proprietors
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will be held at the Friends' School house in this village the seventh day of next week, 1st mo. 5th, at 2 o'clock P. M., for the purpose mentioned in said request. CALEB GREENE, Proprietors' Clerk. New Bedford, 12 mo. 24, 1798.
" Captain Paul Worth, in a new ship of 280 tons burthen, called the Beaver, sailed from Nantucket, on a whaling voyage in the Pacific Ocean, in the year 1791."
" The ship was out 17 months, and was the first belonging to the island that returned from the Pa- cific Ocean." Macy's History of Nantucket, p. 142.
It is probable that the voyages of the Rebecca and the Beaver were nearly contemporary ; but as the time of the sailing and returning of the Beaver is not given in the above-mentioned history, I have published the statement of the Rebecca's voyage as I received it, taken from the account-books of Joseph Russell & Sons .*
Captain William Claghorn, a native of Martha's Vineyard, one of our earliest and most intelligent ship-masters, was probably the master of the sloop Betsey on her whaling voyage, an account of which is given in the sixth chapter. The following elegy, written by the late 'Thaddeus Mayhew, of this city, is taken from a printed copy now in the possession of Mrs. Maxfeld, widow of the late Captain Patrick Maxfeld, now living in this city at an advanced age :
An Elegy to the memory of Capt. William Clag- horn, of New Bedford; who died suddenly, in a
* Since this was written, I have been informed that the ship Beaver, of Nantucket, sailed for the Pacific Ocean in the month of August, 1791, and returned February 3d, 1793.
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fit of the Apoplexy, while on a visit to Boston, February 24, 1793.
No lingering messenger of cruel fate, With slow advances, bade our sorrows wait; The Almighty Fiat, quick as tho't was heard, And sorrow's aspect o'er the world appear'd, No haughty despot's expiating blood, Who grac'd his triumphs with a purple flood; Nor heroes left upon the ensanguin'd plain, In death advent'rous, wakes the plaintive strain: Grief o'er the sound and on the music floats, The muse to Friendship pours her tearful notes, * * *
Suffus'd, o'erwhelmed in tears, with sad complaint. Commix'd with dust the active frame now lies, Nor unlamented social virtue dies; Time's sable curtain's drawn - the hour is past - Nor Claghorn could withstand the conq'ring blast: To sooth his soul in agonizing death,
No kindred friends beheld his yielding breath, So Heaven ordain'd at distance doom'd to die, And strangers honor'd with the parting sigh: By them in earth thy rev'rend limbs were laid, Alas! by strangers thy sad rites were paid. But now the fatal tidings reach thine home, All join the Widow's and the Orphan's moan. A weeping hermit o'er the sudden bier Lo! Bedford drops the sympathetic tear, And joins thy anguish'd Partner to deplore Her fondest hope, and consolation o'er - A Son, unconscious of his father's fate, In distant seas thy death shall mourn too late, Too late return to a fond mother's arms, To sooth her anguish'd soul in grief's alarms, To act the filial and the friendly part, And pour the balm of comfort to her heart. Thy genius known to many a foreign clime; Wisdom and wealth departed shade were thine. Oft on the deep, amid the tempest's roar, By raging ocean wafted from the shore, Thy soaring mind far distant countries sought, And wealth from waves and gaping dangers bo't; The wide Atlantic oft hath been thy path, The Baltic oft from thee withheld his wrath: Thy gen'rous manly soul no danger fear'd, By truth supported and by Justice steer'd - Tho' thou art number'd with the silent dead, Yet not in dust are all thy virtues laid: In thy address sweet condescension shone, And true politeness mark'd thee for her own;
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So long as Justice hath the pow'r to give, Thy shining merits in the world shall live. Almighty Father! gild the stormy day, From thy rich fount emit one cheering ray! O calm her breast whose guardian consort 's gone, A breast to pain and long to sickness known, Their sorrows soften, and dispel the gloom, And wrest the weeping mourners from the tomb; With liberal hand Religion's comforts strew, And cause their minds immortal joys to view; 'Till past the gulph, their tow'ring Souls shall fly, And greet their friend above the starry sky; Where ghastly Death shall lose his mortal sting, And they with joy shall rising wonder sing.
New Bedford, 4th March, 1793.
PHILANDER.
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At my request, the following interesting sketches of a portion of the nautical experience of Captain Edmund Gardner, a native of Nantucket, one of our most respected fellow-citizens, were furnished me. It will afford the public a fair representation of the life and vicissitudes of that class of our cit- izens, to whom New Bedford owes so much of her prosperity.
"After losing the ship Union, of Nantucket, in latitude 38, longitude 44, twelve days out,* pro- ceeded on to the Western Islands, seven hundred miles distant, in two boats, sixteen being the ship's company ; arrived after a passage of seven days. We then took a cargo of fruit from Terceira to New York. On our arrival in the States, found that the long embargo had taken effect, and navi- gation was suspended. Many ships were laid up in New York and in this place. There were one hundred and four square-rigged vessels lying at the wharves in this place, quite a difference from my first visit here in the year 1794, when there werc one small brig and some sloops at the wharves.
* See page 101, note.
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After remaining at home four months, engaged to go first officer of ship Maria, David Coffin, master. The embargo act did not prevent whaling ships from clearing under restrictions to enter no port or place inhabited. We sailed under heavy bonds, and entered no port from 1808 to 1810, when the embargo act was rescinded; then went to the port of Lima for recruits and water, preparatory for the passage home.
On our arrival home the ship Winslow was fitted for me, and sailed in 1810 for the Pacific Ocean; was absent on the voyage eighteen months, and returned in 1812 with a full cargo of sperm oil -1400 barrels.
Soon after our return, the political atmosphere began to lower and the clouds thicken. In the 6th mo., 1812, war was declared against England. I remained at home during the war, three and a half years; and then sailed in the ship Winslow, all my former officers going in her again. After a boisterous passage around Cape Horn, we at last arrived in the far-famed Pacific, and commenced taking oil. We had taken three hundred barrels, and were in pursuit of a large sperm whale. On harpooning him, the whale turned towards the boat, and rolling, brought his teeth directly on my head; one of the teeth pierced my hat and head, leav- ing the skull-bone bare for three inches; one tooth pierced my left hand; two others entered my right arm and shoulder; my jaw, on the right side, and a part of five teeth, were broken. Leaving the whale mortally wounded, I was taken on board the ship. I directed the mate to steer for Paita, where we arrived in six days. On arriving at that port, found no surgeon; sent express to Puno, fifty miles, for one, who came in thirty-six hours. The surgeon was an old man, sixty-nine years of age. He remained at Paita six days, when I was carried in a cot to the country to be near the doctor. I
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remained there between two and three months, under the care of this skilful man. I joined the ship at Paita in a weak state, but pursued the voyage to the completion of a full cargo, and arrived in 1817, having been absent twenty-three months.
From the great loss of blood, I was very weak ; and I remained at home one year and a half, when a ship was built for me, called the Balæna. She sailed for the Pacific in 1818. On arriving in the Pacific, we found many ships and little success, and left for the coast of California. After being there some time, the scurvy making its appearance in the ship's company, came to the conclusion to go to the Sandwich Islands, in company with the ship Equator, of Nantucket; arrived at Owyhee in sixteen days, the first whaling ship ever at those islands, a place of general resort at the present time for ships in the North Pacific. During the stay at Owyhee, we caught a large sperm whale, and took him to the ship. So great was the ex- citement with the natives that all boats or canoes were called into requisition, and many came swim- ming to see the leviathan of the deep. This whale made one hundred and two barrels of sperm oil. It is not unlikely there were as many natives around the ship as were around Captain Cook's ship at the same place many years before. The natives deplore the untimely death of Captain Cook, and are ready to point out the place where Terreeoboo was secreted for many days after the death of Captain Cook, he being the prominent chief who caused Captain Cook to be killed. The Balæna was just one year in the North Pacific, during which time we took 1200 barrels of sperm oil. We finished the voyage and returned in thirty months, having procured 2000 barrels. During this voyage my health was much improved.
I sailed on a second voyage within two months in the same ship, performing this voyage in twenty
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months, obtaining 2000 barrels of sperm oil. On our arrival, sperm oil was selling at thirty-seven cents per gallon, which was not a remunerating price. After a few months, I took the ship South America and performed a voyage to the Coast of Patagonia, being absent eight months, obtaining 1600 barrels whale oil, which was worth eighteen cents per gallon on my arrival. I then quitted pursuing the whaling business, and the following winter, 1824, sailed for Brazil in ship Phebe Ann ; visited Pernambuco, Bahia, and Rio de Janeiro. I returned the following summer, and sailed for the north of Europe; landed the cargo in Hamburg, went to Sweden and loaded with iron for this place, had a hard passage home, and arrived on the day of New Year, 1826, since which I have quitted the seas. The following summer I came to reside in this place, where I have remained for the last thirty years, having been interested in the general business of the place, -- whaling, and various manufactures. I have now arrived at the age of threescore and twelve years, [1857,] a monument of God's mercy for the many favors conferred on me through a long life.
Thus much for a veteran of the sea, having commenced a sea-faring life in 1801, and continued in it until 1826, a period of a quarter of a century."
Since the year 1820, New Bedford has been steadily progressing, and now, (1858,) notwith- standing the great embarrassment in the financial affairs not only of this country but of Europe, which is particularly severe in all large commercial places, there are evident marks of increasing thrift and prosperity, witnessed in the large number of new buildings rising in every part of our city and the environs. Although New Bedford has felt to a
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considerable degree the shock of the late great com- mercial earthquake, she still remains firm, and her merchants and mechanics are undismayed. As one of the oldest seaports in the United States, possessing many advantages as such in the way of experience, there is no fear but that her wealth and enterprise will find new fields of employment as the older ones fail, and we may confidently hope that our city, still in her youth, will continue to grow and flourish. Few places in New England have experienced so rapid an increase in wealth and population as New Bedford. In the year 1790, the population of the village was but about 700; and in 1796, the whole population of the township, which then included Fairhaven, was but 3313. As I have before stated in a previous chapter, New Bedford and Fairhaven were set off from Dart- mouth in the year 1787, and incorporated into a separate township. . The township at this time was about thirteen miles in length and three in breadth. In 1812, as previously stated, New Bedford and Fairhaven were divided. The present township of New Bedford is in its extreme length, that is, from its northernmost bound to the end of Clark's Point, eleven miles, and about two miles in average width, the widest part being from the east bound at Acush- net village due west to Wilson's saw-mill, three miles.
By the census of 1820, the population was 3947; in 1830 it was 7592; and in 1836 it was 11,113; " making an increase of forty-seven per cent in six years."
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" In 1838 the number of vessels belonging to New Bedford engaged in the whale-fishery was one hundred and seventy, employing four thousand hands. At this time there were seventeen candle- houses and oil manufactories. In 1837 there was imported into the United States 181,724 barrels of sperm oil, and 219,138 barrels of whale oil; of this quantity 75,675 barrels of sperm oil and 85,668 barrels of whale oil was imported into the New Bedford district."
The amount of importations into New Bedford for the year ending Jan. 1st, 1858, was 48,108 barrels sperm oil, 127,362 barrels whale oil, and 1,359,850 pounds whalebone; ships and barks employed, three hundred and twenty-four, amount, ing to 110,267 tonnage.
New Bedford was made a city in 1847. The population, by the census of 1855, was 20,389.
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CHAPTER XXVII.
VISIT TO CUTTYHUNK AND GOSNOLD'S ISLET, AUGUST 9TH, 1858-MUSTER-ROLL OF THE COMPANY OF CAPTAIN THOMAS KEMPTON, 1775-ADDITIONAL LIST OF REVO- LUTIONARY SOLDIERS OF DARTMOUTH - LINES BY DR. DANIEL HATHAWAY ON THE DEATH OF DANIEL RUS- SELL, 1772 - RECORDS FROM OLD BURIAL-PLACES - LETTER OF JABEZ DELANO, 1727-SYNOPSIS OF THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THIS VICINITY - CONCLUSION.
CUTTYHUNK AND GOSNOLD'S ISLET.
By the politeness of the Collector of our district, Col. Charles B. H. Fessenden, I visited Cuttyhunk and Gosnold's Islet on the 9th of August, 1858, in the government schooner Ranger,. Capt. Roland Gardner, my object being, if possible, to ascertain by a personal examination and search the cellar of Gos- nold's store-house and the location of the fort built by this early navigator and his companions in 1602.
This island, it will be remembered, was visited by Dr. Belknap, the historian, in 1797, an account of which I have given in the eleventh chapter of this History .* Leaving New Bedford at a quarter past nine, A. M., with a strong and fair wind from the north-east, we passed swiftly across our beau- tiful bay, and at a quarter before eleven (one hour and a half) arrived at Cuttyhunk, distant eighteen
* Capt. William Allen, of this place, who took Dr. Belknap in his sloop to Cuttyhunk in 1797, found the rusty blade of a table knife among the rubbish near Gosnold's fort. Edward Pope, Esq., at that time Collector of this district, and John Spooner, editor of the Medley, also accompanied Dr. Belknap on this visit.
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miles. Gosnold's Islet is situate in a small fresh- water pond at the west end of this island, separated from the waters of the bay only by a narrow rocky beach, so that the sea sometimes flows into it. This we reached in a small sail-boat under the guid- ance of the keeper of the light, Mr. Chandler, who also materially assisted me in the research for the old fort and cellar. The islet contains a little more than half an acre. On the west end is a slight eleva- tion, where we found several stones, apparently taken from the neighboring beach, in a line with a small rock; which we concluded was a portion of the embankment of the little fort. At a short dis- tance from this spot, on the south-west part of the islet, we found a hollow place, and a few stones similar to the others mentioned, which we conjec- tured might have been the location of the cellar ; but the soil being quite fertile, the islet has been ploughed and tilled in years past, so that the ves- tiges of these interesting works are nearly obliter- ated. The space, however, is so small, and the spot so accurately described by the old journalists and early visitors before the surface had been disturbed, that but little doubt remains of the indentical loca- tion of the fort and cellar. At any rate, upon this half acre were erected the fort and storehouse of Gosnold in the month of May, 1602. At this pe- riod the little island was wooded with beech and cedar trees. These have long since disappeared ; but nature, ever ready to repair the destruction of man, still retains a few of the marks of her original productions, and has introduced a few others.
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Growing around the border of the islet were the sumach, the bayberry, the wild cherry, primrose, eglantine, skull-cap, and the Virginia creeper ; the rest of the islet was covered with grass. A solitary bay-winged finch was flying from bush to bush, - a kind of mourner over this sylvan waste. In the pond white perch are numerous.
The surface of Cuttyhunk is very undulating,- a complete succession of hills and dales - barren, - not even a solitary tree, and scarcely a shrub, upon the whole island; not a vestige, even a decayed stump, of the noble old woods that so charmed the old navigator and his companions, was seen in a walk of several miles. A more complete work of devastation of the productions of nature has prob- ably never been effected than may be witnessed upon this and the neighboring islands. Of the whole group of the Elizabeth Islands, Naushon alone retains its primeval beauty ; and what these now desolate spots once were, the visitor who makes the comparison may readily imagine. It is to be hoped that at no distant day an effort may be made to re-wood these otherwise beautiful islands. By sowing the seeds of the forest trees that were nat- ural to them, in the low and more sheltered places, and removing the sheep, a few years' growth would much improve their appearance. Cuttyhunk is about two miles in length, varying in width, and three quarters of a mile wide in the broadest part. In a little pond near by that of the islet the water- lily was growing in great luxuriance, none of which I saw in the islet pond, the bottom of which was
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thickly matted with grass. The present population of this island is forty-three persons, a considerable number of them children. There are seven families : besides that of the keeper of the light-house, Corbit Chandler, those of Benjamin Church, George Slo- cum, Philip Slocum, Holder Allen, William Eliot, and William Veeder. The latter is the agent for the owner, Otis Slocum, of Dartmouth. Upon the top of the highest spot on the island, called " Look- out Hill," is a little ancient schoolhouse, with a fireplace for wood-the building not more than twelve feet square, of the most primitive style. Copicut, or Popicut, is the name of another hill at the north-east end of this island. Canapitset is the name given by the Indians to the passage be- tween Nashawena and Cuttyhunk. Five hundred sheep are now pastured on this island. The light- house at the south-west end of the island is sup- plied with the Fresnel light of the fifth order of lens ; and the whole establishment evinced by its order and neatness the faithful attention of the keeper and his family. Near the light-house are kept two life-boats from the Massachusetts Humane Society, and a large sail-boat of the Vineyard model. In December, 1856, Mr. Chandler, with his son and son-in-law, saved the lives of the crew of the schooner Horace Nichols, consisting of eight persons, wrecked upon the ledge of rocks off the west end of Cuttyhunk, called the " Sow and Pigs." Penequese lies a short distance north of Cuttyhunk, sometimes called "Pune," is the little island Gos- nold visited, and named " Hill's Hap," and took
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therefrom an Indian canoe. This island is also en- tirely divested of trees, and has one family upon it, that of Capt. John Flanders, pilot, the owner.
The following manner of rhyming the names of the Elizabeth Islands has been handed down for several generations :
Naushon, Nonamesset, Onkatonka and Wepecket; Nashawena, Pesquinese, Cuttyhunk and Penequese.
"A muster roll of the Company under the command of Captain Thomas Kempton, in Colonel Daniel- son's regiment, to the first of August, 1775:"
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