USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Lancaster > The story of colonial Lancaster (Massachusetts) > Part 10
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They were soon back in the town which they had left, and later the Melanson family was divided among Lunenburg, Leo- minster and Hardwick. The Benways remained in Lancaster. In the end we find them petitioning to be sent to France, and their names disappear from the records. It is probable that some of the Melanson family married and settled in this section, where there are still people of that name. One well may believe that
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it could not have been easy for these people to live in the same town with the man who had driven them from their homes and country.
Captain Abijah Willard, in the meantime, had returned to his comfortable home in Lancaster, held in high esteem by the King's military authorities. He received a letter from his late commander, John Winslow, in May, 1756, authorizing him to raise a company of men to make another expedition against the enemy. For some unknown reason, he did not go, but his place was taken by two other men of Lancaster: William Richardson went as purchasing agent, and Hezekiah Gates as quartermaster's assistant.
War had been declared between France and England. Early in the spring the Provincial forces assembled at Albany to await the arrival of General Joseph Abercrombie to assume command in renewal of the campaign against Crown Point. General Aber- crombie did not reach Albany until late in June. Then he, in turn, awaited the coming of his superior officer, Earl Loudon, general- in-chief by royal commission, who got there late in July --- so late that all preparations made by the provinces were rendered useless. The expedition did not move from the base of supplies.
Another year ended with nothing accomplished towards the goal of complete conquest of the French and Indians, the only hope for a lasting peace. The New England captains wished they might be left to plan and carry on their own campaigns without British interference. The arrogance of the civil officials and the inefficiency of the military officers disgusted them. Had they but known it there was a sure reward in the self-confidence and ex- perience they were gaining to fit them for what was yet to come, the War for Independence.
The next year was even more discouraging, when in August, 1757, Fort William Henry, at the head of Lake George, was surrendered. A force of nine thousand French and Indians under the Marquis Montcalm surrounded the fortress. The Mass- achusetts men resisted the attack for six days of hard fighting. Then, upon promise from the French general that the troops with their arms and personal belongings should be safely escorted to the Hudson, they surrendered. This promise Montcalm was not able to fulfill. The savages broke through all restraint, plunder- ed the baggage of the soldiers, retreating under Colonel Joseph Frye, and then began a massacre in order to tear spoils from the
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bodies of their victims. Col. Frye and those of his command who escaped lost everything but their lives. No muster-rolls of these men has been found. A few names of those who enlisted in 1757 are preserved in the lists of those who were captured at Fort William Henry.
The turn in the tide came at last, when, in the following summer, 1758, Sir William Pitt was given almost dictatorial powers over the whole situation. He at once adopted a conciliatory policy in his treatment of the American colonies. He repaid them for the expense they had been under in preparation for the contests against the French. He promised to protect them from the greed and arrogance and injustice of the British officials. He recognized their commissions as giving equal military rank, and relieved them from the insults they had received constantly from British officers.
The lazy general-in-chief, Loudoun, was retired.
This treatment inspired fresh confidence and courage in the colonists and when twenty thousand men, the flower of the British army, were sent to join the fray, under the command of General Wolfe and Lord Howe, the enthusiasm of the Yankee soldiers rose high. Lancaster and other towns were not behind in the zeal with which they gathered their troops, and entered upon the campaign of 1758.
Sir William Pitt's policy was that a vigorous assault should be made along the whole frontier. The first attack was towards the capture of Fort Ticonderoga. At least seventy-three men from Lancaster are known to have enlisted, and the adjoining towns swelled the lists of the 7,000 men furnished for the central column of attack by Massachusetts-assigned to the capture of Ticonderoga. The ruling spirit in the attack was Lord George Augustus Howe, who had become a great favorite with the colonial soldiers. Unfortunately he was killed in a preliminary skirmish and his place was taken by the nominal commander of the army, Abercrombie, who managed the attack so badly that Montcalm was again victorious.
During the battle of Ticonderoga Lancaster men were detailed as a rear guard at the saw-mills, where they threw up earthworks. Later they worked at rebuilding and repairing the military roads between Saratoga and Albany. They marched home in November.
Forty-five men of Lancaster were enrolled in the spring of the
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next year. Others from Harvard, Bolton, and Lunenburg swelled the number to 142 under the command of Col. Oliver Wilder, and awaited orders. Col. Abijah Willard again appears upon the scene in this spring of 1759. He commanded a regiment of eighteen companies from all parts of the commonwealth. Each company numbered fifty, rank and file.
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CHAPTER XXXIV Colonel Willard's Orderly Book-The End of the War 1759-1762
COL. WILLARD AGAIN KEPT AN "ORDERLY BOOK" AS HE HAD IN the Acadian campaign. Unfortunately it closes four days before the march on Ticonderoga began. However, Lemuel Wood of Boxford kept a diary during the campaigns of 1759-1760, and from it we get some account of the doing of Lancaster men. They were in camp at Lake George during June and July, 1759, drilling and at practice in firing. From these sources we learn that Col. Willard sentenced two sergeants back to the ranks "for not going to hear prayers." For theft of tools, Abraham Austin, captain of the wagons, was condemned "to receive thirty lashes with a cat- of-nine-tails, at the head of each of the four Regular Battallions and the seven Provincial Regiments in Camp and deemed un- worthy of ever Serving in the Army again." Ten of his teamsters, who connived at the theft, were to be marched around the camp to witness the punishment upon Austin, and then marched back to Saratoga to bring the stolen tools back to camp.
While Col. Willard was severe and exacting, he was solicitous for the well-being of his men. He ordered that "every Tent shall have one side Turned up every Fair Day from eight in the morning until ten-it being much for the health of the men. Likewise that every sick man have his hands feet and leggs washed in warm water and carefully dried every other day."
In the meantime Lord Amherst was making careful prepara- tions for the advance upon French forts which was to be made late in July. Then Ticonderoga and Crown Point were taken with little resistance. Niagara had already surrendered to Sir William Johnson.
In this campaign of 1759, Capt. Thomas Beman, with twenty- two other men of Lancaster, served in Col. Willard's command, and forty-five Lancaster men served under Capt. Aaron Willard and Capt. James Reed. Three of the number died during the cam- paign.
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Lord Amherst dallied again in his plans for pushing northward up Lake Champlain, and in the meantime Gen. Wolfe had im- mortalized himself at Quebec. All New England joined in a thanksgiving for his victory and mourned him as their benefactor.
In the middle of October Amherst's newly built fleet cleared Lake Champlain of the French. Soon the frosts of winter sent the Lancaster men home to their own firesides, to recount their experiences upon the frontier and prepare for the spring campaign in 1760, which was to prove a decisive one.
For six months more General Amherst studied over his plans for a combined movement by all his forces, upon Montreal. Early in the spring Col. Willard, Col. Whitcomb, and Col. Ruggles were in the field with their men. In this campaign Col. Willard's adjutant was Samuel Ward, of Worcester, a man who was later to become an honored citizen of Lancaster for the rest of his life, and whose home here is still preserved by his heirs. Levi Willard is recorded as "sutler" of the regiment and John Miller of Milton acted as chaplain. One company was chiefly of men of Lancaster and the neighboring towns, and served from April to December. The lists of men from Lancaster who served in this campaign numbers at least eighty-five names.
It was the tenth of August before our regiments advanced under Col. William Haviland. They laid siege to the Isle aux Nois, on the 28th, only to find that the enemy had fled in the night, through the swamps. Quickly pursuing, Col. Haviland gave orders that none of the inhabitants in the invaded country be plundered or ill-used: that milk, butter, or any provisions should be regularly paid for; and that the inhabitants be encouraged by good usage to remain in their villages, to prevent them from joining the French army. Whoever should be found disobeying these orders would be hanged. It was much to expect of these men of New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Almost every one of them had suffered, or had friends who had suffered, at the hands of the savages who spared neither women nor children. It speaks well for our soldiers that while they were quartered in the hamlets of their enemies, Captain Haviland openly commended them for having so strictly obeyed his orders. He said that the good effects were obvious, and that hundreds had delivered themselves up.
General Amherst, on the 8th of September, announced that
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the troops of France in Canada had laid down their arms and submitted to the Dominion of Great Britain. The men from Massachusetts were marching back to Crown Point on the 10th. There, to their disgust, they were kept for two months longer to extend and complete fortifications and barracks. Grumbling and discontented, they could see no reason for being kept longer in this western wilderness.
Finally, in November, Col. Willard and Col. Whitcomb marched their troops through the woods, across Vermont to Charlestown No. 4, and thence to Lancaster where they arrived about the first of December.
There is no record of the celebration which attended their home-coming; but from their pulpits the ministers had praised them and noted the universal joy of victory.
The war had lasted six years. Two years followed before the treaty of Paris confirmed the conquest of Canada by England. During that time the forts at Halifax and Crown Point were guarded by New England men, among whom, in 1761, were twenty- five men from Lancaster at Crown Point and fifteen men at Halifax. These were two years of peace for the colonies.
Rev. Mr. Mellen, the minister of the Second Precinct recorded the deaths of nineteen men in his parish. No list was kept in the First Parish records, but the known deaths here numbered four- teen.
The men of Lancaster and the towns which had so recently been set off from her territory, together with men from Lunen- burg, Stow and Fitchburg, and even the western towns of West- minster and Ashburnham, had fought through the long six years side by side, like one family; and the records tell no tales of petty jealousies or discords. They fought a brave fight for a thankless monarch, but gained experience which was soon to help them, when they again united in a common cause.
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CHAPTER XXXV
Town Annals Around 1766
WITH THE COMING OF PEACE IN THE LAND AND THE PRACTICAL certainty that danger from savage attack was over, a new spirit seems to have pervaded the town. Harvests were abundant and a general and joyous thanksgiving went up throughout the land.
There was however, in the minds of the men of Lancaster, no thought of allowing themselves to become rusty in the use of firearms or to go unprepared to defend themselves. As soon as the war was over, the second regiment of militia in Worcester county was organized, and was called the Lancaster regiment. Joseph Wilder was Colonel; and John Carter was Major and Captain of the second company; Caleb Wilder was Captain of the third com- pany. Other officers were John White, Joseph White, Elisha Sawyer, Elijah Houghton, Nathaniel Sawyer, Nathaniel Wilson; Jonathan Wilder is listed as "cornet"; James Carter, quartermaster, and Hezekiah Gates captain of a Lancaster troop. It will be noticed that nearly all the names are those of the descendants of the early planters. Other companies in the regiment were officered by men of Harvard and Lunenburg, Bolton, Leominster, and Westminster.
John Carter became colonel of the regiment in 1766. The next year a Fitchburg company was added: also a second Bolton, a second Leominster, and a fourth Lancaster company.
The regiment consisted of sixteen infantry companies, and two mounted troops in 1771, as follows: Lancaster, four companies; Lunenburg, Harvard, Bolton, Leominster and Westminster, each two companies; Fitchburg, one; Ashburnham, one. The first troop was from Lancaster, Harvard and Bolton; the second from Lunenburg, Leominster and Fitchburg.
All the officers of the Lancaster companies resigned their com- missions three years later, as demanded by the county convention; and in the new elections younger men took their places. Their names do not appear in the continental service, and but three of them are in the rolls of the Lexington alarm.
We have been following the men of Lancaster through the years
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of the struggle for the conquest of Canada, and now we may return to review what has been happening at home.
The first colonial census was taken in 1764, and gave Lancaster 1999 inhabitants, living in 328 families and 301 houses. Of these, 935 were over sixteen, 1037 were under sixteen. Twenty-six colored persons and one Indian are classed separately. The population in the four new towns originally included in the Lancaster grants was 4801. There were but seventeen towns in the whole state with a larger population and ten of these were in Essex county, around Salem, where the Puritans had settled in 1628. It was the largest town in Worcester county, and was the business center for the new towns which were springing up to the west. Industries were thriving: on Bride Cake Plain, Levi and Caleb Wilder were manu- facturing great quantities of potash and pearlash; the slate quarry in the north part of the town was worked, and not far from there was a furnace for the casting of hollow ware; the cooper was one of the busiest men. Ephraim Carter had a tannery at the foot of George Hill; Peter Thurston had a hat shop in the South village, called New Boston. Micah Harthan had a fulling mill and Thomas Grant a loom.
The census shows that agriculture was the almost universal occupation of the people and that every farmer had his flock of sheep, there being nearly 4000 sheep in the town. It was considered a patriotic duty to cultivate hemp and flax, and the knitting needles were never idle while the spinning wheel hummed by every fireside.
The supply of beef, mutton and pork, upon the hoof was much greater than the local need and great quantities of surplus food were for sale. Almost ten bushels of grain, mostly Indian corn, were harvested for each man, woman and child of the population. The prices given for some of the commodities, found in old bills are amusing. Pork was sold at six pence, salt beef at three pence, mutton at two pence, cheese at four pence and butter at eight pence, a pound; corn meal at three shillings, beans at six shillings, potatoes at one shilling four pence a bushel. Barrels in which to carry provisions were made for less than a shilling apiece and cider was little more than seven shillings a barrel.
Pay for a man and horse carrying clothing to Cambridge was six shillings for the trip.
Just what was the status of the twenty-six colored persons in the census list is not known. Slavery was unpopular in Massa-
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chusetts, but there were at least six "servants for life" as they were called, in Lancaster in 1771. In the parish records are recorded the deaths of "Molly" and "Dinah," Negro servants of "Timo. Har- rington," and "Rhoda," Negro servant of "Dr. Stanton Prentice." Both free Negroes and slaves fought in the Revolution and at least fourteen colored men are accredited to Lancaster.
The two doctors of the town, Dr. Stanton Prentice and Dr. John Dunsmoor, trotted from house to house, their saddle-bags filled with aloes, jalap, rhubarb and calomel, and administered blistering and bleeding. In every attic, were hung bunches of boneset, sarsaparilla and mints while mustard, wormwood, saffron, tansy and fennel were cultivated for the cure of minor ailments; and ailing children were sometimes given homemade doses of snail-water or emulsion of earthworms. Some women in each neighborhood had reputations for skillful nursing and knowledge of the uses of roots and herbs, and were often consulted, especially when children were ill. Even the minister sometimes gave drastic doses of drugs when called to pray over the sick. Often, by the time the physician was called, everything else had been tried. Trained nurses were unknown and neighborly kindness furnished "watchers" in serious illness and even "undertakers" when all was over for the patient. Up to the beginning of the present century there have always been certain persons in Lancaster, both men and women, who were called upon to "watch" with the sick.
In spite of the great waste of life in the wars, the growth of the town had been steady. The large and controlling majority was of direct descendants of the first proprietors, and gave character to the town. But several men of political and social influence had brought their large families here since the turn of the century and, by marriage with the members of the early families had tied them- selves to the town. Among these names long prominent in town affairs we find Osgood, Fletcher, Whitney, Locke, Wyman, Bal- lard, and Thurston. All of these names have now disappeared from the voting lists. The town had two doctors, father and son, the Dunsmoors. The elder came about 1740, and the son, Dr. William Dunsmoor, whose mother was of Prescott and Sawyer descent, attained great political prominence and was a leader in the revolu- tionary faction of this neighborhood.
Among the newcomers was Captain Samuel Ward, before men- tioned as holding a commission in the French and Indian War.
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He purchased an ancient house and lot upon the northwest corner of the main road to South Lancaster and the George Hill road, and opposite his business partner, Levi Willard. On the opposite cor- ner, this firm set up a store which became the widest known of any in the region. The senior partner, Mr. Willard, sometimes went to England to buy goods. Captain Ward was not only a man of unusual business ability, but had rare intellectual powers, and excellent judgment. He shunned all official positions, but soon became a conservative leader in the town.
The "first citizen," Rev. Timothy Harrington, had been settled, before the war for the conquest of Canada began, and was destined to see, in his forty-seven years as pastor, more changes in town and national affairs than had yet been experienced.
Unlike his predecessors, Mr. Harrington was married and had two children when he came here. Of several other children born in Lancaster, four lived to maturity; others died in infancy. The mother of his children was Anna Harrington, a cousin, from Lexing- ton; after her death, and quite late in life, he married the widow of Rev. Mr. Bridge, of Framingham.
Mr. Harrington has the distinction of having formed a society of young men for mutual improvement which, so far unquestioned, was the first "Young Men's Christian Association" in the country. There was a long list of articles for the control and advancement of its members. To this list were inscribed the names of twenty-eight young men, all prominent in town affairs. Few people are aware that this internationally known organization had its beginnings in the little parish of Lancaster.
With the coming of Mr. Harrington, in 1748, the location of the parish parsonages changed from the early "ministerial lands" at the crossroads in South Lancaster to a point nearer the first garrisoned house of the Rev. Joseph Rowlandson. An old wellsweep still stands on the lawn of the Nathaniel Thayer estate where the new parsonage, destined to cover two forty-seven year pastorates, was built for Mr. Harrington, and where his colleague and suc- cessor, Rev. Nathaniel Thayer lived. This house shows in its con- struction the improvements in architecture over houses of the earlier period.
During the first twenty years of his ministry this pastor so endeared himself to his people that their devotion and loyalty carried him through the trying times to come. Great changes were
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taking place in religious thought and expression. There was a revolt against clerical councils; and the divine right of the majority was declared higher than the divine right of a king. A bitter con- troversy was raging in the little parish in Bolton. Leominster and Sterling were divided among themselves over the relative power of the church and the clergy but Mr. Harrington's parish remained staunch in loyalty to him, and came through without a break.
We can have but little idea of the bitterness of the controversy which was going on in the churches of New England for a score of years after 1760.
Many of the clergy had departed from the doctrines of Calvin, which had been the standard of faith, handed down from parent to child for all generations since the first settlement of New Eng- land. It took great moral courage to come out openly for a new doctrine. The people were not prepared for the sudden change of faith. Most of the clergy in this vicinity who declared their belief in the teachings of Arminius were dismissed from their parishes. Mr. Harrington, although fully an Arminian, adopted a tempori- zing course, which while displeasing many of his parish, carried him through without dismissal.
There seems to have been no trouble in the Harvard parish. Mr. Mellen, who had been for thirty-four years the minister of the second precinct, Chocksett, was dismissed, but continued to hold meetings with his followers at his own house, and at the school- house, for a number of years. It is said of him that he probably stood at the head of the clergy in the country. His conduct through this trying ordeal was so admirable that many who had been his bitterest foes became his friends.
There was, however, no stemming the tide of change. The increase in general knowledge, a widening intercourse with the world, and especially the study of the law, which had been taken up by many men-all were helping to fit them to take the lead in the politics of the towns. Pastor and people were soon turning the whole current of their thought into one channel-"the arbitrary exactions of parliament"; and political discussions were preparing the way for national independence.
There was some dissension in the parish when the new version of the Psalms was introduced; and again when instrumental music first was used. One man openly "shook his head" when a pitch- pipe was sounded, and one walked out of meeting. The worst they
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did was to absent themselves from Communion. In course of time they were made to see the error of their ways, and after apologizing, were reinstated.
Gradually there had come about a change in dress, social habits and domestic life. The town had prospered. No longer do we find the best bed in the parlor, nor lack of any sort of decoration in the homes. No longer only the parson wore a wig or powdered his hair, nor was he the only one to display knee-buckles, and fine linen at neck and wrists. Cocked hats for the men, and hoops and laces and high-heeled satin shoes adorned the ladies. Curiously enough there was still a stinted supply of household utensils, even in families that were well-to-do.
Books were still too costly to be numerous, but the inventories of estate of the period show that every family possessed a few, mostly on religious subjects.
Education had been hindered by the great expense incurred in preparation of the wars, but the old custom had continued of hiring some college graduate to teach a grammar school two terms in each year. Among these teachers was Joseph Warren, 1759-1760 later to become the president of the Provincial Congress of Massa- chusetts; to serve at the battle of Lexington; to be made Major- general of the Massachusetts forces in 1775; and later to give his life at the battle of Bunker Hill, where he served as volunteer aid.
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