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 3
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woman taking a front seat in the gallery where the unmarried women sat, unless she wore a silk gown, and of course some could never afford it. Thus sometimes do men forget that God is no respecter of persons and only a pure heart counts in his sight.
T.CHUBBUCK SPRINGFIELD MLC
FIRST MEETING-HOUSE IN WEST SPRINGFIELD.
Soon the minister enters. He wears a black gown and white neck band. As he approaches the pulpit stairs, the boys who are sitting there give way and he mounts to his high seat. He prays and reads from the big Bible and then begins his sermon. There is no clock; but by him stands the hour glass, and, if the sermon is very long, he has to turn the glass and
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start the sand running again. Sermons were long in those days. Paper, too, was scarce and costly, and for this reason they were written so fine that they had to be read slowly. When the minister has finished the people pass reverently out, pursuing their several ways up and down the village road, which is indeed the Main street, but almost the only one. Some of the boys have stopped on the edge of the has- socky marsh and are looking into the brook. They are planning to drop a fish line in there tomorrow. Per- haps, if they cross the
marsh, they will flush a crane.
A smithy had been built and a meeting-house, but as yet, after the lapse of forty years, there had been no schoolhouse. We read in the town records of no teacher paid by the town. Perhaps there were, irregularly, dame schools, taught by some woman, who like Goody Two Shoes, received her pay di- rectly from the parents. The most that thechildrenlearned was probably reading and writing, and it was not com- mon for girls to write. Even some of the men, as Miles A DAME SCHOOL. Morgan, could not write. In 1675 there arrived in the town one Daniel Denton, who was qualified to teach.
In other days Our fathers learned the horn-book and the rule, They toed the line or topped the dunce's stool; An ancient dame presided as they read, And if they erred, her thimble rapped each head ; Each little girl a sampler made, in time, And wrought thereon her simple faith, in rhyme. Esther W. Bates.
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He was at once employed for this purpose. He wrote a fair hand and was chosen to write the records of the town business. For a time he taught in a private house. Then a schoolhouse was built. It may seem strange that it was placed on the upper Ferry lane, now Cypress street ; but the land was well taken up at the center of the village Daily Denton and then, again, the children would be coming from not only as far south as Long Hill or Longmeadow, AUTOGRAPH OF THE FIRST SCHOOLMASTER. but as far north as Chicopee.
After a while a rule was made that for every child in attend- ance the parent must furnish a load of wood for the school- house fires. It was a simple school, not of much value for older boys and girls, perhaps. There was reading, writing and spelling, and perhaps some arithmetic; and if Daniel Denton came from England, as perhaps he did, he had some- thing to tell the children of the Old World which they would never see and of which there were no newspapers and very few books to tell them. There were no Sunday schools in those days and perhaps the best teaching in the school was concerning the great things of God such as those set forth in the following verses, which were taught to some of the Spring- field children in the nineteenth century by Dr. Peabody, of whom we shall read later on.
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THE WORKS OF GOD. To be Spoken by Children.
The God in whom I ever trust Hath made my body from the dust; He gave me life, he gave me breath, And he preserves me still from death.
He made the sun, and gave him light ; He made the moon to shine by night; He placed the brilliant stars on high, And leads them through the midnight sky.
He made the earth in order stand; He made the ocean and the land; He made the hills their places know, And gentle rivers round them flow.
He made the forest, and sustains The grass that clothes the fields and plains; He sends from heaven the summer showers, And makes the meadows bright with flowers.
He made the living things; with care He feeds the wanderers of the air; He gave the beasts their dens and eaves: And fish their dwelling in the waves.
He called all beings into birth That crowd the ocean, air, and earth; And all in heaven and earth proclaim The glory of his holy name.
-Peabody, 1799-1847
EMerrill
PYNCHON OPPOSING CAPTAIN MASON'S DEMANDS.
CHAPTER III. THE EARLY GOVERNMENT .- THE PYNCHON FAMILY .- WITCHCRAFT.
W E HAVE already seen that the meeting-house was the town house as well as the church; here the men of the plantation met to arrange all its business. One who did not come or who was late had a fine to pay. Even Deacon Chapin was fined for an absence, such was the import- ance which the forefathers placed upon a careful attention to public affairs. In our own day the President of the United States has often set the example for others by leaving his
-
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pressing duties at Washington and travelling many hundred miles, in order to cast his vote, a vote that counted among the thousands no more than any other.
After eight years the plantation decided to place its affairs in the hands of a committee, a committee which should be chosen once a year; so they selected Henry Smith, Thomas Cooper, Samuel Chapin, Richard Sikes and Henry Burt, to serve for the first year. They were called "seleet townsmen" or "selectmen" and were given power "to order anything that they shall judge best for the good of the town." After that the voters generally met only once or twice a year. Some of the declared duties of the selectmen were to lay out publie highways, make bridges, repair highways, see to the scouring of ditehes, to the killing of wolves, and to the training of children in some good calling. Some of these duties, like the laving out of streets, still belong to the city council and some have become obsolete.
It seems odd to read about the scouring of ditches, for ditches are more used in the old countries, especially in Holland, for the dividing of lots, than here ; but it was necessary to keep the town brook clean, for in it the villagers washed their fresh-killed beef and pork, and from it, to some extent, they probably got water for domestic purposes. For two centuries the town brook was a very useful institution and deserves to be remembered.
The selectmen were especially charged with the killing of wolves, for these were a great trouble, howling and hungry when their food was scarce and picking up cattle and stray pigs that happened to be in the outlands. The town owned a wolf trap. Its stout jaws, hidden by a screen of leaves, when stepped on by the unwary animal, would come together with a powerful snap and hold him by the leg. He could be
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baited by a bleating lamb as in the picture. Another scheme was to so adjust a gun that it would go off when the wolf stepped on a certain spot, to get the bait of meat; but occa- sionally an innocent cow got killed instead of the wolf. A large reward, equal in money of today to about ten dollars, was paid by the town for every wolf killed and the slayer had to bring the ears, or the head or the tail of the beast to the selectmen for proof.
In those days children were more disturbed with stories about wolves than bears, but when in later years, the wolves had been killed off, bears began to be troublesome, for they liked pig pork, butchered by themselves, too well; so a reward was offered for bears and also for catamounts or panthers. It was not only the wild animals that the select-
men had to look after. Everybody kept pigs and the porkers were always watching for a chance to roam about and root up pastures and break through fences with their strong snouts. In the fall they were looking for acorns, just as they do now in the southern states. So the town ordered that they should wear a yoke and have a ring in the nose.
It must have been difficult to make a yoke stay on a pig and many were careless about it; so John Stewart, the blacksmith, was given power to catch every stray pig that was not yoked and rung, and then having put a yoke on his neck and a ring in his nose, to collect pay of
THE HOGREEVE
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HISTORY OF SPRINGFIELD
the owner. A man who looked after swine in this way was called a hogreeve and for a long period hogreeves were annually chosen. There were also officers called field drivers, who were to take to the town pound any horse or cow found straying, especially if doing damage. The pound was on the northwestern part of what is now Court Square and was in charge of a pound-keeper. In after years it was on the spot where now Pleasant street is located.
Another duty of the selectmen was that of perambulation. Perambulation is a very long word for a very long walk which is sometimes necessary in order to set right the bound- ary lines of a town. In our time, upon every road leading out of Springfield, except where the boundary is a river, may be found a substantial stone, marking the division between the city and the next town; but in early times the lines were marked in a very rude way and on the occasion of one perambu- lation the book of the town records reads that " we first marked a little white oak by a pine stump, then next the bottom of the hill we marked a pine staddle and laid stones upon a rock and just over the brook we marked an ash staddle and then next a pine tree standing on the south side of the county road and laid a heap of stones on a flat rock in the road."
This custom, known as "beating the bounds," the settlers brought from the old country where perambulation from very ancient days had been attended with great ceremony. The lord of the manor, with a large banner borne before him, priests in white gowns and with crosses carried aloft and others with bells and banners, followed by many people, walked in procession around the bounds of the entire parish, singing and stopping to take refreshments and having a gala time generally. The procession kept to the exact bounds through fields and even directly through a dooryard, or
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even a house, if it stood on the line. If a river formed the boundary, the procession walked along the shore, while some of the party stripped off their clothes and swam alongside, or, if the stream was navigable, some persons rowed along in boats. Sometimes boys were thrown into it at certain places. When a wall, or tree, or post was near the line, boys were swung against it and bumped. These were called "bumping places" and when the boys became old men their testimony, as to the location of the line, was considered especially valuable, as to any point where they had been bumped. Perambulation of town boundaries is still the law in Massachusetts; but the towns were too large and the people too full of serious work for ceremony and the woods and swamps too numerous to make perambulation anything more than an occasional attempt to see that the bounds were all right.
In the beginning of the previous chapter it was said that William Pynchon was the founder of Springfield and that he was good, and wise and kind. We must now return to him. While John and Mary Pynchon are growing up to manhood and womanhood, he has remained the chief man of the planta- tion. He was the richest man in it, in fact, the only man who had any considerable wealth. He had the most land and the most cattle. Of the cattle, Mrs. Pynchon took the immediate charge, and if she was like many farmers' wives of the early times, she had a good many cows to milk with her own hands and some of the churn- ing to do. Her husband, though a planter, was more prominently a mer- chant and had to spend much time in fur trade with the Indians and seeing
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to the importation from Boston or Europe of things that the settlers needed and could not make. Besides, he owned the mills which ground the corn and sawed the logs on Mill river.
And then, again, he was obliged to spend much time in the public service, because he was the man best fitted to do it, as everybody acknowledged. He was the judge before whom all the people brought their disputes for trial at law. He was a member of the General Court, which met at Boston and made laws for the whole colony. Although he lived away up here, several days' journey through the woods from Boston, he was held responsible, as treasurer of the colony, for whatever money belonged to the Colonial government.
It is a very important fact that the Indians, who, if they had been wrongfully treated might have caused much trouble, found in him one who would do exact justice between them and the whites. For fear of him as a judge, an Indian feared to wrong a white man and because of him and his just ways in trade they liked to deal with the white man Pynchon feared no man; but he feared God and was a man of good will toward men. When the people met for town business it was he who was always chosen to preside. He lived in a wooden house on the spot which would now be the corner of Main and Fort streets and next north was the house of his trusted friend, Thomas Cooper. Posterity is fortunate in the existence of a portrait of him, painted from life. It is now in the Essex Institute, at Salem. He is the only citizen of Springfield, in its first century, the likeness of whose face is known.
Like many good men who are called upon, by their high position, to do difficult things and sometimes to oppose the wishes of other people in doing them, there were those who did not understand and admire William Pynchon. But they
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THE PYNCHON FAMILY
did not live in Springfield. Some of them lived in Hartford. At a certain time, when grain was very scarce, it was necessary for the people of Hartford, Windsor and this plantation to buy corn of the Indians. Mr. Pynchon was given power, by all the towns of the valley below, to buy corn for them all at a certain price and if he could not buy it at the price, to offer more. The Indians held off and would not sell at a price that was reasonable. Mr. Pynchon did not buy; he thought it not best that the Indians should know of the weakness of the colonists; and he did not wish to disturb the market price for corn, feeling that this would be bad, not only for his own trade with them in the future, but for all the colonists. He believed in suffering some present loss, in order to keep a lasting gain. The people of Springfield believed with him, but those of Hartford did not.
Both towns were suffering for lack of grain, and the cattle were getting poor,-Mr. Pynchon's, like those of everybody else. Still Pynchon stood firm. He felt that the white man must be firm and self-sufficient in presence of the savage; and there were Indians up and down the valley who had done much injury to the whites in the Pequot war and might, and in fact did, later, do more. Connecticut had conquered the Indians with the sword, but Pynchon believed in the arts of peace. He believed in suffering for the sake of peace; in getting people to do the things they ought to or the things that one wants them to do, of their own free will and not by force. Springfield was more exposed to dangers of the Indians and to the evil results of disturbing the regular course of trade with them than Hartford.
So Springfield and Hartford differed about this matter and Hartford sent up Captain Mason, a famous Indian fighter, with money in one hand and sword in the other, as it were.
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He was ready to give a higher price for the corn or to fight the Indians if they would not sell. They felt obliged to yield. Mr. Pynchon suffered many hard words from Hartford and Windsor about the matter, but Massachusetts stood by him, as especially did his own town, and in his honor the name of the plantation was changed from Agawam to Springfield, which was the name of his old home in England. In the parish church of old Springfield may be seen an ancient tablet bearing his name as one of the church wardens.
After this Mr. Pynchon again found himself in difficulties with the neighboring colony. That colony had a fort at the mouth of the river, kept for protection against the Indians and Dutch, and insisted that Pynchon's boats should pay toll when they passed it. The tolls were to go towards its maintenance. This Mr. Pynchon would have been willing to do if both Massachusetts and Connecticut could have had control of the fort; but he did not relish the idea of taxation without representation, an idea against which all the colonies afterwards revolted and thus brought on the Revolution. So he refused to pay toll. Massachusetts stood by him and required a toll on Connecticut ships sailing into Boston harbor. Then Connecticut gave way.
But now came real trouble for William Pynchon; for even Massachusetts, except Springfield, turned against him. Wil- liam Pynchon was not only a man of wisdom and peace but of godliness. For this reason he thought and studied much on the goodness of God to his children and the duty that they owed to Him. He loved and studied the Bible and had his own thoughts about it. Here in his house on Main street he wrote a book which he got printed in London and which gave his thoughts on these things. It was called "The Meritorious Price of Our Redemption."
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THE PYNCHON FAMILY
Some copies of this book came to America and three copies are still in existence, one of them in the Boston Athenæum. Because this book was, in some respects, contrary to the opinions then held, it caused much excitement, particularly in Boston and the neighboring towns. The General Court condemned it. By order of this court the book was publicly burned in Boston and its author removed from his position of judge at Springfield.
ET Humil
BURNING OF PYNCHON BOOK.
All these unhappy results of Mr. Pynchon's desire to set before the world what he believed to be the truth were a serious blow to him. He had the best intentions and, perhaps, supposed that his efforts to do good would be met with a spirit of kindliness. On the other hand he found himself
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punished and in the way of continued persecution. For himself he might have endured this. Already there had been thorns as well as roses in his path. Founding a settlement in the wilderness and being mainly responsible for its safety and happiness had not been easy. Yet he was not a man who would sacrifice the public's interests for his own. He apparently thought that though the settlement would suffer somewhat if he left it, yet, under all the circumstances, the responsibility had better be thrown on younger men, after his own leadership had become so much interfered with as, perhaps, to be an embarrassment to his fellow townsmen. Looking back from the long future and in view of the after career of his eldest son, who was early thrown upon his own resources, it really does seem that William Pynchon chose, for Springfield, what was the wisest course, in deciding to return to England, which he did in the year 1652. With him went his friend and minister, Mr. Moxon, and his own daughter Sarah, with her husband, Henry Smith. Thus ended the public career of one of the truly great colonial leaders, to whose character and the character of those whom he naturally drew about him, much of the stability and purity of the public and private life of Springfield has always been, and let us hope, for a long time to come, will be due. When Springfield learns what she owes to him, his statue will be seen in one of her public places.
It was a dark day for Springfield when William Pynchon, Mr. Moxon and Henry Smith set out to spend the rest of their lives in England. It was the loss of the leaders. Other and younger men must now be called upon and it remains to be seen how well they would fulfill their duties. As it turned out, there were good men and true to do what the lost leaders had done, namely, to work together for the good of the town.
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As we look back we see that of these men, the four most prominent were John Pynchon, Samuel Chapin, Elijah Hol- yoke and Thomas Cooper. Others there were who worked loyally with them. Deacon Chapin and Thomas Cooper we know already as selectmen. Who was Elijah Holyoke? In answering this last question we will take our last glimpse of Mary Pynchon. Hers is the first girl's name of any we know among the very first settlers and we could wish that more was known about her. When she came from England she was about the age of the girl in this picture. Soon after she had crossed the ocean to the New World her own mother died and it was after her father had married again that she came to Springfield. As she grew into girlhood so attractive was she that when she was but Upon a bank of violets sweet. Shakespeare. fifteen years of age Elijah Hol- yoke of Hartford asked for her to
be his wife. Her father giving his consent, young Holyoke removed to Springfield and they lived happily together for seventeen years until her death.
In Holland's story "The Bay Path," there is much that is imaginary about Mary Pynchon, but aside from what is here told, scarcely anything more is known than is contained on the stone at her grave in the cemetery :
"She that lies here was, while she stood, A very glory of womanhood."
It was for either her husband or her son, Captain Holyoke, that the mountain was named.
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But the hopes of the town might well have been placed on John Pynchon, who had many of his father's qualities of character and some others that were equally useful. Though born in England, he was but a boy when, after the long ocean voyage, he first saw the New World, and he grew up truly an American. Perhaps he could not, like his father, read the Bible in the original Hebrew; and he may have known nothing of Latin and Greek, all of which William Pynchon had learned at the Uni- versity of Oxford. It may be, too, that his father had taught him something of these things. There is good reason for supposing that he was studious as a boy and when he became a young man he was so much of a scholar that he was some- times expected to preach a sermon of his own writ- ing in the years when the people met for wor- ship, without any min- ister. On other occa- sions, Deacon Chapin or another would read a printed ser- mon of some clergyman.
But John Pynchon had other training which was, perhaps, more useful to Springfield. He had grown up alongside the Indian boys who lived on Long Hill and the Agawam side and well knew the Indian character. This, in the trying times
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that afterwards arose with the Indians was of much conse- quence. Sometimes he was called upon to settle differences between the Indians and other settlements, even as far west as Albany. The Indians called him "brother Pynchon." No likeness of him remains, as boy or man. In those days of hard struggle for a livelihood, probably none was ever made, but the picture on the previous page shows how he might have looked, in his earlier years, studious boy as he was.
As the successor of his father, John Pynchon became the great merchant and trader of the valley. His vessels went down the river with merchandise to be landed at his own wharf in Boston. As an incident of his extensive operations with the Indians and others he furnished a good deal of work to the women and children of Springfield by giving them shells to string into wampum at a given price per fathom. These shells were either white or blue-black and were gathered by Indians on the shores of Long Island. Having been duly shaped they were sent to Springfield to Pynchon and sold to him by the bushel. On being strung they became wampum, the money of the Indians, and also to a large extent of the settlers. Their value arose from the fact that they were so much used by the Indians for ornaments, just as the value of gold arises from the fact that, worthless as it is in the most useful arts, it is universally in demand for jewelry and, like the peculiar wampum shells, very scarce as compared with other metals. From a study of John Pynchon's account books, the historian, Judd, has stated that over 20,000 fathoms of wampum were strung by the women and children of this vicinity. As six feet make one fathom we have a string of beads which would reach from Court Square in Springfield through West Springfield to the Holyoke City Hall and back again through Chicopee.
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Besides being merchant and preacher, John Pynchon was also the recorder or register of deeds, the presiding officer in town meeting and the captain of the train band. He was also the judge before whom suits at law were tried and by whom law breakers were sentenced. There were some laws that he had to execute and some punishments that he had to inflict that seem strange to us. An ordinary punishment was standing in the stocks, an instrument of discomfort so put together that 5 the feet, arms and neck of the cul- prit were pinned to a fixed position and his face exposed to public ridicule. The whipping post, even down to a late period, was a promi- STOCKS. nent object on the street and to it some of the wrong-doers were tied and whipped on the bare back. One of the rules of the army of Massachusetts was that, if any soldier should blaspheme, his tongue should be bored with a hot iron; but probably this punishment was not inflicted. Men were fined for wearing long hair and women were fined for wearing better clothes than they could afford.
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