USA > Massachusetts > Hampden County > Springfield > The history of Springfield in Massachusetts for the young; being also in some part the history of other towns and cities in the county of Hampden > Part 2
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Fully to appreciate these changes, climb the stairs of the Arsenal at the Armory, on a summer day, and come out on the open platform. To the east and west are the mountains that once confined the sea; to the north are Mount Tom and Mount Holyoke that remain to tell the story of volcanic outburst. Beneath is the river, the mere relic of its ancient self, but still majestic. All about is a mass of green leafage, in which more than in almost any other city, Springfield is
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
embowered. The crash of mountains, lifting their heads for the first time to the sky, the flash and smoking of volcanic fires, the rush of molten lava to the surface, the awful approach of the great glacier, carrying destruction on every hand, the strange huge reptiles that trod the shores of the inland sea,- are forever gone. To the chaos and disorder of the old earth's making has succeeded peace. The time is ripe for man; for human happiness and love. It was into this scene of quiet beauty that the forefathers came to establish their homes.
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NATURAL, FEATURES
TO THE CONNECTICUT RIVER.
From that lone lake, the sweetest of the chain That links the mountain to the mighty main, Fresh from the rock and swelling by the tree, Rushing to meet and dare and breast the sea -- Fair, noble, glorious river! in the wave The sunniest slopes and sweetest pastures lave; The mountain torrent, with its wintry roar Springs from its home and leaps upon thy shore :- The promontories love thee-and for this Turn their rough cheeks and stay thee for thy kiss.
The young oak greets thee at the water's edge, Wet by the wave, though anchored in the ledge. -'Tis there the otter dives, the beaver feeds, Where pensive oziers dip their willowy weeds, And there the wild cat purrs amid her brood, And trains them in the sylvan solitude, To watch the squirrel's leap, or mark the mink Paddling the water by the quiet brink ;- Or to out-gaze the gray owl in the dark, Or hear the young fox practising to bark.
Thou dost not stay, when Winter's coldest breath Howls through the woods and sweeps along the heath- One mighty sigh relieves thy icy breast, And wakes thee from the calmness of thy rest. Down sweeps the torrent ice-it may not stay By rock or bridge, in narrow or in bay- Swift, swifter to the heaving sea it goes,
And leaves thee dimpling in thy sweet repose. Yet as the unharmed swallow skims his way, And lightly drops his pinion in thy spray, So the swift sail shall seek thy inland seas, And swell and whiten in thy purer breeze, New paddles dip thy waters, and strange oars Feather thy waves and touch thy noble shores.
-Brainard, 1797-1828.
FIRST SETTLERS ON THEIR WAY TO THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY
CHAPTER II.
THE SETTLEMENT .- THE SMITHY .- THE MEETING-HOUSE.
I T WAS in mid-May of the year 1636 that the settlers of Springfield left Roxbury to find themselves a home in the valley of the Connecticut. There were not many, perhaps twenty, perhaps forty, who came at first. How many chil- QUY KIRKMAN: LYCH .GATE . ALL-SAINTS . CHURCH SPRINGFIELD - ENGLAND dren there were we do not know; but there were at least two. Their names were John and Mary Pynchon. John and Mary were both under twelve years old, but old enough to walk some part of the way and some of the time they probably rode on one of their father's horses. In fact, their father, William Pynchon, was the leader of the expedition and the founder of the new plantation. There could have been no better man for the purpose. He was alike good and true, brave and kind, and understood how to deal with white men and Indians. John and Mary grew up to be like him in many respects.
The travelers were, of course, some days, perhaps a week, on the journey; for they had only the forest path to follow, good enough for Indians, but not so good for people incum- bered with luggage and traveling with horses or cattle. At night they made a camp around a blazing fire and some one
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
probably stayed awake to keep a lookout for Indians, while the others slept. When the morning broke, they read the Bible together and sang psalms before again starting on their way. As John and Mary Pynchon were born in England they were doubtless interested in the flowers that marked the springtime in the new world and amused themselves every day, gathering columbine, lady's slipper, wake-robin and the novel kinds of violets. Now and then they would see Jack- in-the-pulpit sticking up his head under a green canopy, and curious pitcher plant meadow-cup, not yet in bloom. In the dry woods they would pick partridge berries. As for dande- lions and buttercups, that now make such a bright show in the spring, Mary and John were to reach this region quite ahead of them; for these are English plants that in after years were to spread over the country from seeds brought by the colonists.
At last the settlers arrived on the banks of the wide-rolling Connecticut. The shade of the forest was behind them and here were pleasant open spaces and rippling waters and the bright sun shining over all. To the north was a mountain, outlined against the sky somewhat like a couched lion, but later to be known by the simple name of Mount Tom. In this new home they were, perhaps, sometimes lonely, thinking of the homes over in England, but they were not exactly alone. Older inhabitants of the land were about them, the friendly Indians who lived on the banks of the Agawam and on the heights of Long Hill and who were glad that the settlers had come, and sold them land on which to build and to plant.
To John and Mary Pynchon the Indian children must have been both queer and interesting as they rolled down the banks in play or shot toy arrows at imaginary game. On the plains east of the river, and in fact, all about, their fathers and grandfathers, time out of memory, had chased the deer and
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THE SETTLEMENT
the rabbit and for many years to come the arrow heads that they lost in the chase will be turned out of the soil by those who never saw an Indian. A Springfield boy found one of these in the garden, years after another in a hen yard, and a third at the foot of a telegraph pole where workmen had been upturning the soil. The Indians could neither read nor write; they have gone, leaving their history untold as men write history; but the stone implements they made and the names they gave to rivers, ponds and hills, remain to tell how they lived and what they thought.
The Indians planted some corn and pease; they taught the newcomers how to make the savory succotash, and the dish and the name, just as they gave it, are likely to last. But they lived mainly by hunting and fishing and did not use much planting ground. So they were willing to sell to William Pynchon and his companions a long stretch of excellent land on both sides of the river. Their own planting grounds were at the mouth of the Agawam river, near which they cured their fish for winter use and thev sold to the settlers Massack- sick, (Longmeadow), Usquaiok, which is the land in the neighborhood of Mill river, and Nayasset, the meadow land stretching north from Round Hill. All these lands were good for planting and pasture. That extending up the hills back from the river on both sides had no value to the Indians but for hunting, and they seem to have been willing that the whites should use it in common with them for that or any other purpose, like the cutting of firewood. The land was made over to the settlers by a written deed, the meaning of which was carefully explained to the Indians, and their chief men signed it by making, each, a picture at the bottom. Their pictures included an arrow, a canoe, a bow and a feather, things of everyday Indian use. The price paid was ten
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
fathom of wampum, ten coats, ten hoes, ten hatchets and' ten knives.
Why did the settlers choose this place right here in the valley, close by a tribe of savages, instead of establishing themselves on the highlands or remote from the river? First, because the land, all Massacksick, Usquaiok and Nayasset, was excellent land for cultivation; and, again, because being near the river was like being today on the line of a railroad. The Indians were continually going up and down the stream in their canoes and, by the river, beaver and other skins could be sent away to market and other goods brought from Boston or England. Mr. Pynchon was a shrewd trader and made much money by buying skins of the Indians to send away. The beaver, almost humanly wise in building its curious dams, has been, of course, long since gone, and is not now found nearer than northern Maine; but in those days, the region about and above Westfield was the heart of the beaver country, for the valley trade. The otter, (page 18) a fish- eating animal, was once common, but is now very rare here- abouts.
A SETTLEMENT WITH WELLSWEEP AND VIRGINIA RAIL FENCE.
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THE SETTLEMENT
Just where the houses of the settlers should be on this great tract of land which they bought was, of course, an important question. At first they expected to settle on the Agawam meadows, and, in fact, had put up one house there; but the Indians told them that the meadows were flooded in high water; so they decided in favor of the east side of the "Great River," as they began to call the Connecticut, and they did, in fact, call it by no other name for a hundred years. From Round Hill and above, down to Mill river lay a good stretch of plough land, good for corn and wheat, and right across the stream was ample pasture. This meadow land was bounded on the east by a long narrow marsh, so full of hummocks that they began to call it "hassocky marsh." It occupied land between the present Main street and the line of Chestnut and Maple streets. Its west boundary was the brook mentioned in the previous chapter. It must have been somewhat troublesome and of course was filled long since; but by jumping from one hummock to another, the high and dry land could be reached, where there was a heavy growth of trees, some of them probably maple and chestnut; so that Maple and Chestnut streets are properly named.
From these trees could be cut wood for the fire or timbers for canoes; but good, large canoe timber was so scarce that after a man, with much labor had got a canoe made, he was not allowed to sell it out of the town without consent of the inhabitants. It having been decided where the street should be, the houses all on the west side, each settler's land extended in a rectangular form eastward from his house across the marsh to the upper terrace and westward across the river for some distance into the meadows there. A century and a half were to pass before there would be a bridge over the stream. Connecting the street with the river was a narrow
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
lane in the line of the present Elm street and another which is the present Cypress street. At the foot of the first lane, close to the river, were the training field, the burying ground and the pound. Another lane was opened to the "lower landing" at York street.
Nothing has been told us about the early house building, but many settlements resembling that in the picture have been made in New England and other parts of the country. It was warm weather and at first there were probably rude camps, made of the boughs of trees. The first house was presumably of logs, the cracks filled with clay or mor- THATCHING THE SHED. tar to keep out the cold. For a roof there would be a thatch of straw or grass. When the long snowy winter began, so unlike the short open winters in England, where flowers sometimes bloom in February, they perhaps felt very comfortably settled. It may be that some of the first houses were not of logs. The falls in Mill river were set to work as soon as the machinery of a saw mill could be got from Boston; and the result was boards and shingles and elapboards, for those who could afford them. When the first erop of grain had been raised and threshed out with the flail, the same little stream was set to the grinding. No wonder that they called it Mill river, regardless of the Indian name. Its mills were all in all
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THE SETTLEMENT
to them, for now, thanks to it, they had good housing and wholesome living.
In some respects, indeed, they lived better than in the old country. They had to get used to much colder winters; and many conveniences which they had enjoyed before, they could not have here. But the land easily gave them enough to eat in greater plenty than England could have done; partly because of their cultivated fields, partly because of the wild game, such as quail, partridge, ducks and pigeons. In fall and spring the pigeons passed over sometimes in such num- bers as almost to darken the sky. These they caught in nets. Game birds were shot with a fowling piece for scattering the shot among a number of birds at once, like that on the shoulder of Miles Morgan in the Court Square statue. If woodchucks or moles became troublesome to the crops, there was a simple way of catching them by bending down a slender staddle
fitted with a slipnoose and slightly fastening the end by a peg. When the offender nibbled the bait and was caught, he was jerked into the air and hung suspended.
Established at last in the wilderness, all alone except for a few Indians, how was it that the forefathers, grown-ups and ·children, employed themselves? What did they do for work
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
and play? There was plenty of work: cutting down trees for firewood; hollowing great logs for canoes; planting corn in spring, hoeing it in summer and husking and threshing it in the autumn; boxing pine trees on the plains and making the oozing pitch into tar and rosin; cutting grass for hay and getting it into stacks for winter use. In these things the young folks, and even children, must have had an important share. The many mechanical helps to labor in these days were lacking and it was a time when "many hands make light work," even little hands.
In that day and, indeed, well along into the nineteenth century, boys and girls had to invent and make many more of their playthings than they do now, when so much is done by machinery. Girls could make rude dolls and boys make traps and snares and little water wheels and pin boxes out of the stems of elderwood. Here is an English boy of five hundred years ago who probably made the windmill he is whirling, just such a one as boys make now ; and below is "Mary Bump," an aged Springfield doll. Her body is a corn-cob. There was not much art but there was invention and imagi- nation, and it is from these, in the end, that art comes.
Some of the comforts of the old country were wanting, but they were more than made up in the spirit of freedom and independence in a land where some great lord could not turn the people off the soil if he chose, and where they could worship God in the way they pleased.
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THE SETTLEMENT
It was not so in England. Only Mr. Pynchon had been a landholder there and not many years after the settle- ment of Springfield the fierce struggle going on in Eng- land for political and religious liberty ended in a civil war, which cost King Charles his crown and life. The fact that the settlers here had land for the using of it made them all farmers, whatever calling they had followed in the old country. To cultivate the soil was the most natural
OLD-TIME ENGLISH CHILDREN PLAYING HORSE.
and easy thing to do. At first there was no minister (we are speaking of all the early times) who was not also something of a farmer, as many ministers were even down to Dr. Osgood in the nineteenth century.
But there is one trade which is very necessary even to a small community of farmers; there are horses and oxen to be shod, plows mended and all sorts of farming and domestic implements to be repaired, and in a place so far away from the rest of the world as Springfield, these would sometimes need to be made on the spot. For all this there was need of a blacksmith. After ten years had passed no one had come to the settlement who could do this work or do it well. There
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
are many kinds of smiths, like whitesmiths and locksmiths, and how many people gave especial attention to smithery is plain when one stops to consider how common is the name of Smith. But the blacksmith is, in a young settlement like Springfield, the most important of all. The townspeople felt that they must have a blacksmith, and just as one puts up a bird box expecting the birds to come and nest in it, they actually paid Francis Ball in wheat for building a blacksmith shop when there was no smith in sight. It had a chimney and forge, and one door and a window. There were rings in the chimney.
Bcc the sparks; how then fin! Let the anvil ring ! Dammerco bard, welded tight, Jron to iron shaft cting.
The building done, Mr. Pynchon, through his agent in London, bought a blacksmith; a strange thing to do, but this is the way it came about. There was war between England and Scotland and in the battle of Dunbar the Scotch were defeated and many of them brought as prisoners to England. Not knowing what to do with them, the English, following the custom of those days, sold them into slavery, but not a slavery for life. In the end they were to be free. Such was the lot of John Stewart, who was sent to Mr. Pynchon in this plantation and at once established in the new smithy. This
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THE SETTLEMENT
was a great blessing to the village and, one can well imagine, a source of never ending interest to its children. There is a charming mystery in the union of two pieces of red hot metal, whose explanation, if there be one other than the power and mystery of God himself, lies far back in the secret laws and workings of nature.
All that Longfellow has written of the Village Blacksmith,
" A mighty man is he With large and sinewy hands,"
was doubtless true of John Stewart, as all the children be- lieved, when they looked in at the open door. When the blacksmith had paid by his work for his passage over the sea and the other expenses Mr. Pynchon had incurred for him, he was given his freedom by Pynchon and the town presented him with the smithy.
About the time that the smithy was built it was decided to build a meeting-house. Before this, when the townsmen met to make rules for the plantation, or all the people met for worship, they had gathered in a private house, or in summer, perhaps, under some wide-spreading tree. Everything was as yet very simple as compared with the old country, where they had churches of stone, some of them quite beautiful with tower and colored windows, and curious carvings without and within. Notice the contrast between the churches repre- sented on these pages. In the sim- GARGOYLE OR EAVESPOUT, STONEY STRATFORD, ENG. plicity of the new world one building must serve for all public gatherings, be it public worship or town meeting. So they spoke not of the church,
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
but called the building the "meeting-house." In the language of the law, in Massachusetts, this is the word still used. Town and church were pretty much the same in the early days of New England and the whole village supported the one and only minister.
It was planned that the meeting-house should be forty feet long and twenty-five feet wide; that it should have two floors or stories, the lower one to be nine feet high. For a time the upper one was used for storing grain, until, at last, the people began to be afraid that the heavy weight would come down upon them and they took away the floor and built galleries round about the sides. But this was not for several years. The building having been planned, it was de- cided that it should be placed on the spot which is now the southeast corner of Court Square. Thomas Cooper was em- ployed as the contractor who should construct it. He agreed to take his pay in wheat, pease, pork, wampum, debts and labor. It is easy to see from this what, in those days, was most common in passing from hand to hand. Not a penny of English money was to be paid for building the meeting- house; it was too scarce. Wampum was the money of the Indians and made of shells. Upon the meeting-house there were built two turrets or little towers. One was for the bell; in the other a watchman could stay during service or at other times, should the Indians be hostile, and watch lest some Indian thief steal into the village or even a whole war party make a sudden dash into the street.
In order that we may see all the townspeople gathered together, in these early days, let us make in imagination our attendance at the meeting-house at the hour of public worship on some Sunday. The sacred day had begun at sundown of Saturday and will end when the Sunday's sun has set behind
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THE SETTLEMENT
the Berkshire hills. It is, we will say, the year 1663. Passing along the main street and turning down the lane that has since been widened and called Elm street, we enter, as all the people do, by the side door on the south. There seems to have been no door opposite the pulpit. We find ourselves directly under one of the galleries. Some of the people are
CHURCH OF OLD SPRINGFIELD, ENGLAND.
already seated and others are coming in. They know it is the time of service, not because they have any clocks or watches (most of them), but because John Mathews has been beating the drum up and down the street and because the bell in the turret is now ringing.
The people are seating themselves just where it has been voted that they shall sit. Anyone who should sit elsewhere would be liable to a fine of three shillings and four pence.
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
We are taken up the alley, as they called it, on the south side and are shown into a seat not far from the pulpit. Just before us, in the front seat, are some of the selectmen, among them Thomas Cooper, the builder of the house. Back of us is Thomas Day, who had married his daughter, Sarah, but neither Sarah Day nor her mother is sitting with the husband. In those days it was not thought proper that the women should sit with the men, and the women all found seats together. Up in the gallery we notice Miles Morgan in the place where the selectmen have appointed him to be in order to check any disorder among the boys or young men. Most of them are sitting there. Next the pulpit, in the deacon's seat, dis- tinguished in some way from the other seats, is Deacon Chapin. Just how he looked or how Miles Morgan looked, if one gazed directly into their faces, nobody knows; but the statues in their honor show us what kind of men they were, what sort of garments they wore and how they appeared as they went about the town. The sculptor has represented Deacon Chapin on his way to "meeting" and Miles Morgan going afield with his hoe and fowling piece.
Most of the people whom we see in the audience are of English birth or descent, but Reice Bedortha probably came from Wales and John Riley was from Ireland. Peter Swink, who sits under the gallery, is a black man in the family of Mr. Pynchon and in the seventh seat is John Stewart, the Scotchman. Longfellow writes of the village blacksmith that
" He goes on Sunday to the church And sits among his boys,"
but our blacksmith seems not to have been blessed with any family except his wife. We may suppose, though, that when
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THE SETTLEMENT
at his smithy he made friends with the children who
" coming from school, Looked in at the open door,"
if, indeed, there was a school in those days.
We notice an especial seat, which we are afterwards told was made for a guard of soldiers, and therefore called "the guard's seat." No guard now occupies it, for the Indian war, that raged in the Connecticut colony about the time when the town was settled, is long since over and the Springfield Indians have always been peaceable; so the guard's seat is occupied by boys, who like to get together in it or to sit on the pulpit stairs. Anthony Dorchester sits with them to keep order, for even old time boys were mischievous. Sometimes .on week days they broke the meeting-house windows in their games, and this meant a fine of twelve pence apiece.
In some of the New England churches wealth and rank determined where people should be seated. This was at times and perhaps always, to a certain extent, regarded in Spring- field; but not so much as in some other places. Age was also regarded. As much as the forefathers loved freedom and as much as they, in their sturdy principles, have done to promote equal rights for all, they were not yet free from many old world notions about rank and the importance of property in giving a standing in society. Outside the church these things are very liable to be wrongly estimated, but inside it might be supposed that those who studied the Bible would remember what is there said: "The rich and the poor meet together; the Lord is the maker of them all." Yet even as late as the early part of the last century, in the old white church of West Springfield, an all-compelling custom did not admit of a young
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