USA > Massachusetts > The story of western Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 15
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Though physical conditions at Wethersfield, Hartford and Wind- sor were far more alluring than at Springfield, the strict church ele- ment dominant there left much to be desired. It was that same rigidity that later led to the secession of the people who founded Hadley in 1659. The benign influence of William Pynchon at Springfield is exem- plified in the sermons of Rev. George Moxon. Young John Pynchon, as a lad of fourteen, kept a shorthand record of some of the pastor's teachings. For nearly three hundred years these remained but an unsolved puzzle, but recently they have been entirely decoded and are most illuminating. The texts were from the New Testament; the ser- mons were of love. "We are in a new country", said Moxon, "and here we must be happy, for if we are not happy ourselves we cannot make others happy". Moxon's God was a God of love, which the
135
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
Puritan God was not. Little of hell-fire and damnation emanated from the Springfield pulpit in those early days.
On the east side of the Connecticut, the site selected for the new town was but a narrow spit of land, in length from Round Hill to York Street and in width from the river to the Main Street. On the west
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Poral 45by cum -54. 0. 0
Per for & pagando 21 par -63. 0. 0
2.10. for 36. falgan & t.y. wamy allo 18.5. 0
165.15.
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& 10 attori fims & 4 hours
Pynchon Account of September 23, 1636
was the River and on the other three sides an almost impassable marsh; the remains of a prehistoric bed of the river in an era when the Main street district was an island in fact. East of the marsh, extend- ing to the top of Armory and Crescent hills, was a fairly heavy growth of timber, called the "wood lots". The plain beyond and easterly to the Wilbraham hills was described as being "pine barrens inter- spersed with unimprovable swamps". The marsh was known as the "hassocky marish", and was quite wet and covered with hillocks or hummocks of coarse grass. In the old country they used to dig out those hassocks by the roots and after being well dried they were used as kneeling stools in the churches. In time, a framework was made of
136
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
wood and stuffed with that same grass, and so our grandmothers got the hassock of the household and the name for it. Scattered about the marsh were sizable ponds. Until modern times, Frost's pond, a favorite skating place of our fathers, covered the area now enclosed by Market and Court streets and Harrison Avenue. The "Laundry pond", in 1875, was at Hillman Street. In the last century it was not unusual to skate from the Town to Brightwood.
Nearly connecting Round Hill and the hill at the junction of Locust and Main streets was a lower hill, a sort of backbone, running the entire length of and parallel to Main Street. It is impossible to determine how high this hill was, but in 1675 the second meeting house was ordered to be built on that hill, and in 1728 the church horse sheds were located at the foot of the hill, so that it must have been of noticeable height. At a parish meeting, May 27, 1749, it was "voted to level the hill where the old meeting house stands, in such manner as shall be proper for the suitable setting of the new meeting house in that place". A vestige of the hill can be seen today in the mound on which the Court House stands and it is even more apparent at Bliss and Howard streets. Further confirmation of its existence is shown in the County Records of October 1, 1832, giving the original lay-out of West State Street as running three hundred seventy- nine feet westward from Main Street to the brow of the hill, thence nine hundred twenty-four feet to the bank of the River. To one familiar with engineering procedure, this breaking of the course indicates a hill too high to see over. This data definitely indicates the location of the highest point though it unfortunately gives no suggestion of the height of the hill.
The Town street was laid out along the edge of the marsh and the bank of the marsh determined the present-day line of Main street. At the south, the street ended at the impassable marsh and turned west to the river with a lane which is now York Street, and at the north it also turned to the river at the lane which is now Cypress Street. A third road was "the way to the Training Place", now Elm Street.
On the west side of Main Street, from Cypress to York, the home lots, some forty in number, were laid out. The majority of these home lots were eight rods broad, from the street to the river, but on the easterly side of the street, each lot owner had a strip of the same width as his house lot, running to the top of the hill. That on the lower ground was a part of the marsh, later known as the wet meadow, with wood lots beyond. Within these enclosed home lots were not only the houses and outbuildings, but orchards and gardens as well. There is ample evidence that the homes of those early settlers were not those log cabins so beloved by poets and painters which actually were unknown in pioneer New England. Log houses were first built in America by the Swedes who came to the Delaware in 1638, but it was many years before knowledge of such construction spread to Massa- chusetts. The earliest log cabin of which there is any local record was that built by David Morgan for John Pynchon in 1678. This was at
137
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
Round Hill, which had been given to him in 1654 for a sheep pasture and undoubtedly was to house a sheep herder. Springfield carpenters and builders planned and built in the English tradition, the type of houses they had known in the old country. The roofs were thatched, the sides were of weather boarding or wattle-and-daub. Rather com- plete details of the house built for the first minister in 1639 are of record. It is shown to have been a two and a half story building, with an entrance porch, the second story of the latter being designed for a study. The roof was thatched and the walls were "wattled", that framework being covered with clay with a result not unlike a stucco house in appearance. The rods of the wattling were known as "wales" and the process of covering them with clay was called "daubing the wales". Such construction was well adapted to the mild winters and damp summers of Old England, but here the settlers found that this clay-stucco siding succumbed to the rigors of ice and snow, and for protection they were forced to overlay it with an outside covering of boarding. Continuous winter fires and hot, dry summers constituted a fire hazard that led to the early abandonment of thatched roofs.
Until the coming, about 1645, of Hugh Parsons the brickmaker, chimneys were built after the English manner, in cob-house fashion of round sticks, daubed with clay. The fire terror was ever present. If the household fire became extinguished through neglect, it was cus- tomary to send to a neighbor's for glowing embers to rekindle it. During transportation, a fickle wind might carry sparks to a flimsy roof, so it was ordered that no person "should carry fire in the street without a covering". In addition, it was provided that "every householder shall have in readiness about his house a ladder about sixteen rungs or steps, at least, to prevent the damage of fire".
The development of local building constuction is plainly shown in known examples of early Springfield. The first church of 1645 had wattle-and-daub sides, but the roof was shingled. Seven years later the outside was clapboarded. The shop built for the village smith in 1646 was "boarded, both roof and sides". The first schoolhouse, built in 1679, had sides of clapboards and a roof of shingles.
Apparently the daubed house persisted for a considerable period for at a hearing in the witchcraft charges against Hugh Parsons on March 17, 1650-51, John Lombard testified "that one day last summer he set a trowel and a stick which he used to hold to his clay when he daubed, on the ground just without his door; after which two Indians came in and presently went away again. When he went out to look for his trowel, there was the stick, but the trowel was gone". Thus the tools of the trade seem to have been in common use at least as late as 1650.
In many New England towns building construction was influenced by an abundance of stone, but at Springfield it was equally influenced by an utter lack of it. The town proper, the meadows west of the Connecticut as well as the high ground east of the town, were all absolutely devoid of stone of any kind. Such was the scarcity that the minister's house built in 1639 had "the sides of the cellar planked".
138
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
Evidence of the value placed on stone is shown in the selectmen's order of February 10, 1652-53, which "granted to Rowland Thomas liberty to carry away those stones he hath dugged in Powcowsack river by the end of June, no man to molest him in the mean time".
John Pynchon's account books show numerous payments for stone brought from Small Brook, which was nearly five miles from the town; a tedious and expensive journey with a lumbering oxcart. In time an outcropping ledge of sandstone was found near Benton Street, at a place called the Stone Pit. To make this available, the Middle Causeway (State Street) was extended to it, the extension being known as Stone Pit Road.
There was of course an inexhaustible supply of stone to be had from the river bed and banks at Enfield Rapids, but it was not of a fire-resistant quality, and so did not fill the crying need for material for fireplaces, hearths and chimneys. Moreover, its carriage was a most arduous upstream journey. The very nature of such freight meant heavy weight, which in turn meant heavy scows. Nevertheless. through dire necessity, its use was increasingly resorted to. The return of the Continental Ferry at Springfield for 1778, includes a charge of £84 for bringing up "fourteen boat loads of stone at 120 shillings per load".
As a conclusion to the covenant of May 16, 1636, Pynchon, Smith, Burr, Mitchell and Blake were constituted a committee for "the grant- ing of house lots". So promptly was their task completed that the apportioning must have been a mere formality to give legality to a prior act. Sizable tracts were confirmed to the eight individuals who signed the covenant and to four additional inhabitants. Four of these tracts were adjoining to the mouth of Mill river and eight were in the commercial district of the present city. These latter grants were thus laid out.
The course for a street along the bank of the marsh was first determined,-the Town Street of that era; the Main Street of today.
Lot number one, with its south bound approximately on the modern Court Street, extending from the river to the high ground east of the marsh (Chestnut Street) and having a street frontage of sixteen rods, was assigned to William Blake.
"Next to the lot of William Blake, northward, lay the lot of Thomas Woodford, twelve rods broad and all the marsh before it to the upland".
Both Blake and Woodford defaulted on their obligations and these two lots, being retrieved by the town, eventually became incorporated into the scheme of eight-rod lots allocated to later inhabitants.
Lot number three, twenty rods broad and extending from Har- rison Avenue north to beyond Vernon Street, went to Thomas Ufford who did not remain a sufficient time to even build a house. After George Moxon was accepted as pastor of the local church, he acquired the Ufford lot and in 1639 the town built a parsonage on it for his
139
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
use and occupancy. On Moxon's return to England with William Pynchon in 1652, the town bought the property from him and it was held for the benefit of the ministry, until sold in 1806 by order of the General Court.
"Next the lot of Thomas Ufford lay the lot of Henry Smith, twenty rods broad and all the marsh abutting at the end and running to the upland on the other side". The north line of this lot was at the south line of Bridge street. Soon after his step-father's return to England in 1652, Smith followed him there and in 1654 this property was bought by Thomas Cooper who was killed by the Indians in 1675, upon their assault on the town during King Philip's War.
Lot number five was granted to Jehu Burr, who remained a resi- dent for barely five years. With his kinsman John Cable, he became discouraged with the local situation and together they removed perma- nently to Fairfield, Connecticut, in 1641. In 1640 Elizur Holyoke had come to Springfield, and marrying Pynchon's daughter Mary, he acquired this property, extending from Bridge to Worthington streets. It continued fairly intact until the laying out of Worthington street in 1837.
Next north of the Burr lot was that of William Pynchon, from the present Worthington Street to Lyman. Prior to Pynchon's departure in 1652, he conveyed the property to his son John, in whose ownership it remained until the subsequent century.
Lot number seven, from Lyman Street to the railroad, was that of John Cable. On his removal to Fairfield, Connecticut, with Jehu Burr in 1641, the town paid him £40 for his lot and buildings, reselling the property in 1643 to Thomas Cooper, who had then recently arrived from Windsor, Connecticut.
The last of these lots, extending from the railroad to Liberty Street, went to John Reader, who, however, never became a resident. The lot reverted to the town, eventually becoming a portion of a grant to Miles Morgan.
"The lots of Mr. Matthew Mitchell, Samuel Butterfield, Edmund Wood and Jonas Wood were ordered to lie adjoining to Mill brook, the whole being twenty-five acres, three of the lots on the great river and the fourth on the other side of the small river".
Samuel Butterfield was related by marriage to Matthew Mitchell and it is quite probable that Edmund and Jonas Wood also were kinsmen. Why these four should have chosen such a remote section for their habitation is inconceivable, and it can hardly be presumed that it would have been an involuntary choice. In the agreement itself, William Pynchon's name appears seven times, each time being pre- ceded by the title of "Mr." Matthew Mitchell's name appears twice and in both cases his name is also preceded by that same title, while none of the other individuals is thus distinguished. This abbreviation of "Master" indicates that the person to whom it was applied very probably held a degree of Master of Arts and possibly was a cler- gyman.
J 23 war, ont 7 4- Petit. 4
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A Page from William Pynchon's Account Book of 1636
141
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
The Tunage of the Blessing from the Riuers mouth to the warehouse
T h b fir
mr Pynchons goods in the blessing 5. 1. 0. 1.
g Burr & Woodford out of the blessing 4 2. 0. 2
mr Smyth Jo: Reader
1. 21%. 2
1 3. 2
. 13. 1/5h &. 7fi
The most of this I pd for to new Towne
only 2 boate loads came from the
Riuers mouth his man had stick & greneginger in sickness 2s
also there came of mine in the boate 1 pr Cart wheles 1 long coolr & 3 collers & 1 cart sadle & harnes & a rope 1 barrell pich & 1 firkin fruit trees. as in the note apers but a Trundle bedd & other things were put into the pinace
& the fraite of all my owne goods T hds in the Batcheler is 11 2 1 fi
Jo. Readers Tunage is 1 T 3hhds 1 bar
Transcript of the opposite page
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A Page from William Pynchon's Account Book of 1636
143
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
Reed of g Burr of a [torn] in my litle book
1. 18. 7
for + T. 1/2. frait to the warehowse
5. 8.
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for 2 Tun by the bacheler
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Recd: his mans worke for 10 weekes
6. 16. 0
more dd
1200 nayles
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for boating 2. Tun fro Roxbury to the pinac 0.
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Transcript of the opposite page
144
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
In any event, the quartet never occupied the land allotted to them. In October of that yer, 1636, "old man Mitchell" and Butterfield were active about the new settlement at Saybrook, Connecticut. "Five men of Saybrook went up the river about four miles to fetch hay from a meadow on the east side. Some Pequots set upon the men and one they took; the brother of Mr. Mitchell who was the minister of Cam- bridge, and roasted him alive. He was a Godly young man called Butterfield, whereupon the meadow was named Butterfield Meadow".
The granting of twenty and thirty rod house lots on that May day in 1636 marked the ultimate of such largess. The adventurous "gentlemen" were at that time largely provided for and no additional ones came clamoring for admittance. Dreams of empire, of manor houses and baronial halls, faded away in the face of stern reality.
Grandiose schemes had been in the making in New England. At Saybrook had been built a "great hall" enclosed by a defensive barrier. The importation there of "ironwork for two draw bridges", including material for a portcullis suggests visions of moated castles.
The actual prospect was uninviting. A sordid, squalid outlook, with cattle, swine and naked savages very much in the foreground. Disillusioned, the remaining ground in the town plot (Harrison Ave- nue to York Street) was divided into lots eight rods wide, "meet for the quality and estate" of the husbandmen and artisans who were to provide the life blood of the town. But it was nearly a decade before those plots were fully occupied.
Following the organization of the town and the division of the house lots, Pynchon remained for some two weeks and then proceeded to Roxbury, accompanied by Henry Smith. On the seventeenth of the previous March, in preparation for his removal to the Connecticut, he had sold to the younger Winthrop, the greater part of the contents of his Roxbury warehouse. As this merchandise well illustrates the type of wares with which the English allured the Indian trappers, it is of interest to note just what this comprised. Included were fifteen bolts of woven cloth, with a total of 509 yards at an average price of nearly eight shillings a yard, which came to £197. In addition were seven items commonly sought by the natives. These were,-
2 dozen looking glasses 0
4 12
8
3 one quart pots
0
0
4 dozen Jews harps
0
4
0
4 dozen steel awl blades.
0
5
4
1 dozen porringers
0
10
6
1 dozen occomy spoons
0
6
6
15 large hoes
1
10
0
£3
13
0
Here was a grand total of a bit more than £200, with a present day value of perhaps $5,000 to $10,000. On April 22d at Roxbury, Pynchon had sold to Winthrop, one hundred forty-three yards
145
THE FOUNDING OF SPRINGFIELD
more of cloth, and he now consigned to him at Saybrook, two hundred twenty-five yards additional and accepted from him, twenty-one sheep for the new plantation. As these were uniformly priced at €3 each, it would appear that they were all adult animals, probably twenty ewes and one ram.
For transportation of a final twenty-four tons of his goods to the Connecticut, Pynchon chartered the barque Bachelor, and with recol- lections of his previous disappointing experience with the Blessing, he conditioned with her skipper that the cargo should be discharged at Watertown (Wethersfield), to which port Lieutenant Edward Gibbons "confidently affirmed she might go, there being water enough" for a vessel of her draft. On the Bachelor also sailed Pynchon's three daughters and their maid, accompanied by Ann Pynchon's husband Henry Smith. For their passage Pynchon paid an additional ten shillings each.
Pynchon's letters and accounts afford surprisingly complete evi- dence as to his movements during that period. In recent years, a bit of confirmatory evidence has become available that should be known by historians. William S. Elwell, known as the Crescent Hill Artist, who died in Springfield in 1881, was a painter by vocation and an autograph collector by avocation. There came into his possession an account book kept by Pynchon in the earliest days of the town. In it, various individuals were debited for their share of the cost of the freight transported by the Blessing and the Bachelor.
In the customary Pynchon manner, the little book was also used for the recording of indentures and similar covenants. When the book came into Elwell's hand he removed one sheet of four pages, because on one of these there was an agreement which included the signatures of various local men prominent at the time and for these autographs, Elwell kept the four page fragment, burning the rest as wholly lack- ing in interest. Only the research student can realize what was thus denied to historians. After Elwell's death, the four page sheet became the property of Ernest Newton Bagg, a Springfield journalist. Being unable to decipher it, he asked this writer to supply a typescript, granting in return, permission to photograph the original. Mr. Bagg later became helplessly crippled and while smoking at his desk, acci- dentally set fire to its contents. As a result, all that remains of Wil- liam Pynchon's account book of 1636, are the four photographs here reproduced for the benefit of posterity.
One especial reason for Pynchon's visit to the Bay that summer of 1636 was his realization that some measures must be taken for adjusting relations between the settlers and the natives before they became more strained. It was difficult for him to argue or explain, being handicapped by a lack of precise knowledge of the local dialect, which differed sufficiently from that of the Indians about Massachu- setts Bay, with whose language he was familiar, as to make it impos- sible for him to negotiate efficiently. On this occasion he arranged with Ahaughton, a Massachusetts Bay Indian, recognized by the courts as
W. Mass .- I-10
146
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
a competent interpreter, to accompany him to the Connecticut and assist in his negotiations.
Early in July, having completely liquidated his Roxbury affairs, Pynchon once more made his way over the Connecticut Path, accom- panied by Ahaughton, together with John Allen. John Cownes, Rich- ard Everett, Joseph Parsons and Faithful Thayler.
Though there is no positive evidence of the fact, by a process of elimination it may be safely concluded that with him also went his wife and his son John, then ten years old. This would have been no especial hardship, for women of that day were accustomed to long journeys in the saddle and the lad was fully competent to travel on his own horse or on the pillion of an older rider. The bridle path was then well known and the group was of sufficient size to cope with any ordinary hazards.
CHAPTER XV The Bay Path Myth
N O ARM-CHAIR student can accurately visualize the ways of the people of the wilds. To understand primitive folk one must have lived in the open, preferably at an age prior to that when opinions have been influenced by extraneous reading. One expects to rely on opinions expressed in weighty tomes and especially do young people accept the statements of their elders. This writer speaks feel- ingly and in great humiliation, for in his younger days, with youthful enthusiasm, he brought together all available printed matter relating to Indian trails, and produced a map showing "Indian Trails About Springfield" that resembled a spider's web. Not until he later acquired first-hand information on the subject, did he realize how erroneous was the foundation on which he had built. Since then he has had an acute understanding of the importance of positive evidence, either physical or documentary.
Probably Josiah G. Holland, author of the History of Western Massachusetts (1855), is more than any one else responsible for the survival of the Bay Path myth, and its consequent intrusion into all local histories of that section. He was a journalist and novelist; author of the novel Bay Path, who dispensed his so-called history in a popular form which gave it wide circulation and long life, but his tales were based on relations of the "oldest inhabitant" rather than on documentary evidence, and do not agree with recorded facts.
At a later period Holland was seconded by other unqualified writers at whose hands a little learning became a particularly vicious thing. Facts were distorted to support prejudiced theories and to bring fame to the "old home town", but the findings do not conform to the unabridged recorded facts. Unfortunately, however, their con- clusions are considered authoritative by the unknowing and will prob- ably so continue. Competent scholars have also been misled, which has added to the confusion.
The theories developed by these writers, are based on the wholly incorrect assumption that in prehistoric days the various sections of the country were connected by deep-rutted foot paths, called Indian trails and that these trails were adopted by the settlers, eventually becoming roads suitable for wheeled vehicles. Actually, the Indians were not dependent on any definite route for their travels, the country
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