USA > Massachusetts > The story of western Massachusetts, Volume I > Part 30
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45
292
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
hundred and twenty bushels of charcoal are sufficient to smelt rock ore into one ton of pigs".
This of course was a low-grade ore, being about eighty-five per- cent high grade hematite with fifteen percent water, but the fact that the deposit continually renewed itself, made it an inexhaustible supply of great value. With modern equipment it would probably yield sixty percent of finished product, but with the crude process of the day, it is doubtful if it yielded half that.
News of the find spread quickly and, as a result, on April 3, 1693, the selectmen were instructed to "send to the man that we hear would set up iron works in our town and inform him that the town is willing to encourage him all that they can in that affair and give him any liberty as to improvement of iron ore in their commons as shall be rational and that the town would be glad if he would come and give ns a visit".
This was John Mighill, one of a family of experienced iron- makers who had been instrumental in the formation of similar enter- prises in the eastern part of the state. To the selectmen, with but a meager knowledge of the requirements of the business, his requests for grants of woodland sufficient to properly operate a plant seemed so outrageous that the conference came to naught. On February 5, 1694-95, "John Dorchester, with his partners, being desirous to set up iron works in this town, moved to have liberty of the stream of Skipmuck River and forty or fifty acres of land where it may be most convenient to set up said works and the free use of any ore in the commons and liberty of wood for coals for the said design, their desire was granted provided that they set about the work to some good effect within twelve months". That project lapsed by default, but at a town meeting December 5, 1696, John Pynchon and Joseph Parsons "made some proposals in order to the setting up and carry- ing on an iron mill for the producing of iron and the town consider- ing the great benefit it will be to this place, have granted them free liberty for the taking and improving all and whatever iron ore mav be found anywhere within our township, also the free use of wood for coal anywhere in our commons provided it be not within three miles and a half of the town".
That arrangement not being satisfactory, the following January, Pynchon and Parsons, "for the better accommodation of an iron mill design, did desire the town to grant them one hundred acres of land, also twenty acres near the place where the iron works shall stand, for pasturing and other necessary occasions". There was immediate objection made to this last proposal. The older settlers, who for years had submitted to the dictatorship of the Pynchons, father and son, had passed on and the voice of a second generation was being heard in the councils. For sixty years a monopoly had been had by them in the town grist and saw-mill, and owing to poorly constructed dams and very inadequate equipment, the service was far from satisfactory to the growing town. However, at the town meeting of March 9, 1696-97, they had "free liberty granted them to
293
THE BLAST FURNACE
set up an iron work or mill, upon the Mill River below the place where the corn mill is now standing", but the grant was subject to four conditions.
First, that they would "not damnify the way for passing over Mill River". Second, that Pynchon would maintain an adequate grist-mill as long as he kept possession of the saw-mill grant. Third, that he would agree to certain specified charges for the grinding of grain. Fourth, that "when the design of the iron work is wholly laid aside and ceaseth, then the stream to be under the same circun- stance it was before this grant".
Thus the stage was set for the building of the plant, which Pynchon arranged for in characteristic manner. He never hesitated to take the helm in any enterprise, however lacking he might be in a knowledge of the requisite details. He never relied on his own ability, but worked on a system of which modern industrialists have taken advantage, for he always commanded the services of an expert in the line he was for the moment engaged in. The building of the plant was left to Joseph Parsons. After the installation of the dam and water-wheel, the next problem was to find a source of supply of stone that would bear powerful and long-continued heat .. A good firestone requires a union of qualities that is not too comnon. To answer well for a furnace, a rock must not only be infusible, but not liable to crack. Hence, the presence of lime or magnesia, except as silicates, is unfavorable and although pure quartz resists fusion well, it is liable to crack. On the other hand, some stones contain so much of potasia that they are converted into glass. After a trial, the red sandstone of Sixteen Acres proved admirable for the purpose, and a good foundation stone was found at Small Brook. Various team owners were glad to cart these in to the mill site for two shillings a load. Bricks for the stacks and outer covering of the furnace were made at the brick kiln where the Armory grounds slope to Pearl Street. The furnace was about twenty-four feet in diameter on the outside and nearly thirty feet in height. The interior was egg shaped, small at the top and bottom, and eight or ten feet wide at the widest part. Behind the furnace was a pair of bellows twenty- two feet long made of two-inch oak plank. These were compressed by knobs on the axle of the water-wheel, being raised again by counter weights, as soon as the knobs slid by and worked alternately, one giv- ing the blast while the other was rising.
In the spring of 1698 the plant was ready to operate and John Mighill was engaged to instruct the workers. Pynchon paid him for "eight days or eight days and half with Mr. Parsons at my iron mill", and evidently during that period all necessary information was extracted from him, as that is the last time his name appears on the ironworks accounts. One important thing they learned from him was that in the absence of lime for a flux, the Long Hill clay banks provided a good substitute.
The manufacturing process as described at the time was as follows,-
294
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
"The first work is to calcine the ore, which is done in a kiln much after the fashion of our ordinary lime kilns. This they fill to the top with coal and ore which they let burn until the coal is con- sumed, when they renew the kiln with fresh ore and coal. This serves to consume the more drossy part of the ore and makes it friable. Thence they carry it to the furnace, which is filled with ore and cinder intermixed with charcoal, laying it loosely at the bottom so that it may more easily take fire. After it is once burning, the
State Street, Willow to Main, Springfield, 1830
materials run together, in a hard cake or lump, which is sustained by the furnace and through this the metal runs as it trickles down the receivers, which are at the bottom, where there is a passage open by which they take away the scum and dross and let out their metal, as they see occasion. Before the mouth of the furnace is a great bed of sand, where they make furrows of the fashion they desire to cast their iron. Into these, when the receivers are full, they let in their metal. After the furnace is once at work, they keep it constantly employed, never suffering the fire to slacken, night or day, supplying the waste of fuel and other materials, with fresh, poured in at the top. From the furnace, they bring the sows and pigs of iron, as they call them, to the forges, which are two sorts, though they stand together under the same roof. One they call the finery and the other the chafery".
295
THE BLAST FURNACE
Here, with repeated heatings, the mass was worked under the tilt- hammers, which were also operated by the water-wheel. John Hough- ton, in 1697, called the square first made, a half bloom. This was reduced in size at the center, leaving a bar with two knobs, which he called a bloom, the greater end being called the mocket head and the smaller the ancony end. At the third heat,-there being three heats in all,-the ancony end was reduced to a bar, and at the fourth and fifth heats, the mocket head was also reduced. Thus the ore was brought to a merchantable condition for the use of the smith.
"For several other purposes they have sort of cast iron which they take out of the receivers of the furnace as soon as it is melted, in great ladles and pour it into moulds of fine sand". By this process were made pots, kettles, andirons, clock-weights, cogwheels, for mill machinery and similar articles.
"Every six days at the furnace they call a foundry in which space they make eight ton of iron. They expect that one man and a boy at the finery should make up two tons of iron in a week. Two men at the chafery should work up five or six tons in a week". The complement of men for the furnace was eight or nine, besides cutters of wood, coalers, carters and other common laborers. "Several attempts have been made to use sea-coal (which Pynchon brought here in his own ships) in these works instead of charcoal, the former being had at an easy rate, the latter not without a great expense, but the workmen find by experience that a sea-coal fire will not penetrate the most fixed part of the ore, by which means they leave much of the metal behind them unmelted".
Various neighbors furnished the required charcoal. On October 24, 1698, Samuel Ely contracted to deliver twenty loads of ninety-six bushels each, one-half by the middle of the following July and the balance by the middle of October, twelve shillings a load being the price, or £12 for the 1920 bushels, or about three cents a bushel. However, maximum wages for a laborer were then but two shillings a day, as against possibly $10 at the present time, so that to arrive at a proper comparison, Ely's price should be multiplied by twenty, giving sixty cents a bushel in the value of the present dollar.
The quality of the product turned out at the plant was so excel- lent that when the present-day smith has a particular piece of work in hand he searches the scrap pile for a piece of the old seventeenth century iron. Modern processes excel those which they have replaced more in the uniformity and quantity of their production than in their quality. Mechanical skill has united with the subtle operations of the chemist to increase production and lessen costs, but to the old opera- tors must be given the palm for quality.
In May, 1698, the selectmen tried to saddle onto the mill owners, the entire expense of repairing the highway, but met with a flat refusal. By November the road was in such a condition that it was imperative that something be done, so a compromise arrangement
.
296
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
was arrived at, the town paying one-half the cost and the mill owners the other half. From that time on the enterprise moved along in a modest way, doing its bit through the Revolutionary War and eventu- ally becoming Trask's foundry. With the coming of the railroads, the furnace was given up, as it was cheaper to buy pig iron than to make it. Finally, it was moved to Water Street, now Columbus Ave- nue. Out of this grew the Agawam Foundry, the present Springfield Foundry, and allied with the Agawam Foundry was the Talcott Axle Works which furnished the inspiration that resulted in the forma- tion of the Wason Car Works.
In 1708, inspired by Pynchon's success, John Stewart's former protege Obadiah Miller, together with Luke Hitchcock, Jr., were "granted the use of Mill River between the town saw mill and Clark's meadow to set up some works to make iron and land convenient for managing the design". This also was in operation through the Revolution, and after the establishment of the National Armory in 1794 it became the forge of the lower watershops. In time, the old tilt-hammers at the Watershops plants were replaced by drop-ham- mers. There were trained the generation of drop-forgers who con- tributed so much to the early success of some of the prominent industries of the present Springfield.
In 1779 "the proprietors of the iron-works on Mill River were granted land and water privileges near by for a paper-mill", but as the needs of the army were deemed paramount, the grant was rescinded.
Colonel William Smith, who was commandant at the Continental Armory at Springfield during the Revolution and James Byers who had been engaged in the casting of cannon for the American Army, jointly secured a lease in 1786, of a parcel of land and the water rights at Chicopee Falls on condition that they erect ironworks on the premises. A blast furnace for the manufacture of iron hollow- ware was erected but it was not very extensively worked until it passed into the hands of Benjamin Belcher and others in 1801. Under various owners and in various forms this project was continued, finally becoming the Belcher & Taylor Agricultural Tool Company, which continued well into the present century, but which has now wholly ceased to be.
To one not familiar with the circumstances, tales of the quantity of high-grade iron produced from native ore in Western Massa- chusetts seem almost fantastic. So far-reaching were the results of the industry that the products became famous, not only in America, but throughout the world.
In 1732 a very prolific mine was opened at Ore Hill in Salisbury, Connecticut, and it was later found that a deposit of similar ore extended northerly across Massachusetts to southern Vermont, which was commonly known as Salisbury ore, from the town where it was first mined. The famous frigates, Constitution and Constellation and
297
THE BLAST FURNACE
the Fort at the Battery in New York City, were armed with cannon of Salisbury iron.
On December 13, 1750, Col. Ephraim Williams executed a lease for what was perhaps the earliest mining project in Berkshire County, which read in part,-
"Whereas, it is suspected that a valuable mine may be discovered upon a certain parcel of land now in controversy between the Indians belonging to Stockbridge and Colonel Ephraim Williams of said Stock- bridge, therefore I, Ephraim Williams do lease and let out unto Thomas Dewey and Israel Ashley of Westfield and Timothy Wood- bridge of Stockbridge, the use and improvement of one-half of said mine, so long as it be judged valuable, provided it be discovered within twelve months after the date hereof".
Apparently no one prospered from the prospect, for some humor- ist of two centuries ago endorsed the document with the words,- "Captain Williams Lease,-a valuable mine now minus".
Numerous mines were opened in Berkshire County and a number of furnaces erected. Prominent amongst these were the Berkshire Iron Company and the Pomeroy Iron Company at West Stockbridge; the Briggs Foundry at Lanesboro; Cheshire Furnace, Cheshire; the Lenox Iron Works; North Adams Iron Company; and the Richmond Iron Company at Richmond Furnace.
At one time during the Revolution, Assistant Quartermaster Gen- eral Walter Pynchon was stationed at Great Barrington, where he gathered materials and supplies from wherever they could be found. On November 21, 1779, he wrote to his superior officer, Lt. Col. William Smith at the Continental Armory in Springfield, that he was forwarding "thirteen bundles of nail rods, thirty-one thousand ten penny nails and three thousand four penny nails", all of which were made from Berkshire iron.
At the outset, wood was plentiful throughout the district so that charcoal was readily available, but when the local supply dwindled, it was brought in from Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, and later from Virginia and the Carolinas. The use of charcoal, plus the high quality of the ore, joined in making Salisbury iron a superior product. It was of especial value where the metal was subjected to impact from sharp blows, as in car wheels and cannon. During the Civil War, iron from Richmond was used in the making of Rodman guns, no other iron being acceptable for that smooth-bore gun, designed for use with extra heavy charges.
During World War I, some of these mines did their bit in bring- ing victory, and in World War II the Ore Hill plant was very early readied for the same purpose.
Increased production and the superior qualities of steel, the ease with which its composition can be controlled to a nicety never dreamed of before, together with its cheapness as developed between
298
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
1890 and 1910, offset the advantages that the Salisbury ore had because of its superior quality, and first destroyed the prestige of the iron industry and finally ousted it completely. The art of making steel of qualities to exactly meet a particular need, and of making it so cheaply that iron could not compete, completely changed the situa- tion; the quality of the ore now being only of minor importance. Chemists and metallurgists can remove the small amount of undesir- able elements that may exist in the ore, while desirable elements can be added to fit the product to a specified use.
CHAPTER XXX
The French and Indian Wars
I N WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS, the final decade of the seven- teenth century was a period of storm and stress. With the eleva- tion of William of Orange to the throne of England there came a conflict with France known to history as King William's War. Once more the dread of savage Indians filled the nights and such forebodings became very real when Brookfield was attacked in August, 1692. On June 6, 1693, Deerfield was attacked as well as in September, 1694, August, 1695, and again in 1695. In the summer of 1698 Hatfield was assaulted.
The authorities had learned nothing from the experiences of King Philip's War and persisted in drawing from isolated towns, the men needed for garrisoning the extreme frontier settlements. John Pynchon pleaded desperately for a change in policy, but his pleas reached only deaf ears. In 1697 the Treaty of Ryswick brought an end to hostilities but it proved to be no more than a temporary truce.
In the midst of the strife and turmoil, the Salem witchcraft mania broke out, nineteen persons being hanged in 1692 because of their reputed alliance with the devil, but the last recorded case of suspected witchcraft in Western Massachusetts was that of Mary Randall, who was virtually acquitted by the Springfield Court on September 29, 1691.
In the last year of the old century, on January 9, 1699, died Amy Wyllys Pynchon, aged seventy-four, wife of John Pynchon and mother of his four children. Fifty-four years they had lived together and now he was the sole remaining member of his generation. Of his four children, John Pynchon, Jr., alone remained, together with the latter's two sons, William and John Pynchon, third. This youngest John was the favorite grandson and for him, the elder procured the office of Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas and the Court of Sessions at Springfield, and he was later chosen County Registrar. Now he was to live with his grandfather in the echoing Mansion House where these two lone men were attended by two negro slaves, a man and a maid. On February 18, 1702, young Pynchon married Bathshua Taylor, daughter of Rev. Edward Taylor, first minister of the church at Westfield, and in the Mansion House his
300
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
fourteen children were born. And there, the Springfield register records, "the Honourable Colonel John Pynchon, esquire, was sick and died in the seventy-seventh year of his age". It is fortunate that this record has been preserved, for in all the voluminous writ- ings, it is the sole bit of evidence to indicate the year of Pynchon's birth.
The patriarch was honored with a funeral such as he would have considered his due. His devoted negro servant, Tom, bathed the body and reverently wrapped it in its shroud before it was en- coffined.
A squad of troppers, such as he had so many times led against the savages, now led the cortege to the "burying place", west of the church and approximately where Elm Street now meets Columbus Avenue. There the troopers fired a volley over the grave.
The overseers of the estate paid Thomas Merrick £2. 9s, 6d "for drink at his funeral", besides which five gallons of rum and sixteen pounds of sugar were consumed. All this in addition to three-and-a- half pints of rum "in his sickness".
The inventory of the estate included some of the sumptuous trappings that John Pynchon had craved all his life. His collection of plate had grown to a point where it was valued at close to £50. There were six pewter dishes and a dozen plates bearing the coat- of-arms of his ancestors. He had owned a silver hilted rapier; a trooping scarf with gold lace; gloves with silver lace; ten yards of gold and silver lace; two knots of silver ribbon; and a light colored doublet with gold twist and sand-colored britches.
But the glory of the Pynchons was on the wane. In 1754 there died in Suffield, John Pynchon, one of those fouteen children born to the favorite grandson, John Pynchon, third. Three years before his death he had written to the church at Springfield, the following letter, the original of which is in the records of the Suffield Church,-
"Suffield, July 19th, 1751.
To the Reverend Mr. Robert Breck,-
It hath pleased God to lay his hand on me by a long sickness for about a year and am very much reduced and unable to get things necessary at the doctors nor pay for them and am advised to ride on a journey in order for the recovery of my health and not able to support myself on a journey because of my poor circumstances, therefore would beg the charity of your church and congregation for me. Please communicate it to the church the next sabbath and would beg their charity towards me the sabbath after.
I entreat your favor towards me.
I am your humble servant
JOHN PYNCHON"
With the accession of Queen Anne, hostilities between England and France again broke out, war being declared May 4, 1702. One of the first places in New England to suffer was Deerfield, a party
301
THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WARS
of French and Indians from Montreal, numbering two hundred fifty falling upon the sleeping town on February 29, 1704, killing sixty of the inhabitants and carrying off a hundred prisoners. In 1706 a number of persons in the valley were killed. On March 21, 1713, the Peace of Utrecht concluded the war.
During the years 1722-1725, while France and England were at peace, war broke out with the Abenaki Indians of Maine. Early in the year 1724 Fort Dummer was built, at what is now Brattleboro, Vermont. A treaty of peace was concluded December 15, 1725, and hostilities ceased with little damage done in Western Massachusetts.
(Photo by Harry Andrew Wright, 1890)
Home of Ariel Cooley at Skipmuck
On March 20, 1744, war once more broke out between England and France, and Massachusetts resolved to erect a chain of forts to protect her northwestern frontier. Accordingly a fort was built at East Hoosac, now Adams, and named Fort Massachusetts; one in the present town of Heath, called Fort Shirley; another in Rowe, which was named Fort Pelham; and a small fort at Blandford. On August 26, 1746, Fort Massachusetts was invested by a French and Indian force numbering eight or nine hundred. The twenty-two defenders of the little stronghold fought valiantly for twenty-eight hours when they were forced to surrender. At the same time a sortie was again made against Deerfield, where three were killed and one was taken prisoner. The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, signed October 7, 1748, put an end to the war.
By the second quarter of the eighteenth century, Springfield had spread out in all directions, settled communities being established in
302
WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS
West Springfield, Agawam, Longmeadow, Wilbraham, Skipmuck and Chicopee, including Upper Chicopee, as the section north of the river was known. Hence, many were so far from the church that the Sabbath journey was an irksome task, often attended by actual danger to life and health for both man and beast. As a partial relief from such conditions, at a town meeting held in 1728, ten of the younger men from one of the outlying districts were given leave for "setting up a house for their horses at the south-west end of the meeting house in the town plat". Two weeks later seven of Upper Chicopee were granted like permission. Later that same year, five young men were given leave "to build a horse house in the lane at the foot of the hill at the meeting house, by Major Pynchon's lot". Thus the trials of the dumb beasts were in part alleviated, but the lot of the humans was little bettered.
In 1698 West Springfield had organized a separate church, and Longmeadow in 1716. Wilbraham ordained its own minister in 1741. Upper Chicopee, however, had no relief from the long trek, though informal discussions and protests grew general. Various petitions for the establishment of Chicopee as a separate parish were most vigorously refused, the mother church fearing the results of the financial loss that would accrue by the secession of so great a number of parishioners.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.