USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Worcester county; a narrative history, Volume I > Part 4
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Let it be said for the red man, that in his war against the New England English, he respected his women prisoners, and as a rule treated his child captives with the same kindness he showed his own offspring, and finally ransomed most of his prisoners so that they returned to their homes unscathed.
"They revered unseen powers," wrote Bancroft," they respected the nuptial ties ; they were careful of their dead; their religion, their marriages, and their burials show them possessed of the habits of humanity, and bound by a federative compact to the race. They had the moral faculty which can rec- ognize the distinction between right and wrong; nor did their judgments of relations bend to their habits and passions more decidedly than those of the nations whose laws justified, whose statesmen applauded, whose sovereigns personally shared, the invasion of a continent to steal its sons."
These, however, were the New England Indians as they lived before they came into too close contact with European civilization. They deteriorated rapidly. The chief reason, of course, was the influence of strong drink, which was wholly new to them. The white man sold them rum and beer, and they yielded delightedly to intoxication. Orchards were planted for some of them and they were taught to make cider. They drank of it thirst-
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THE NIPMUCK COUNTRY AND ITS PEOPLE
ily. They learned to distill powerful spirits from the fermented juices of their grain, and joined in wild drunken orgies. They were unable to assim- ilate wholesomely the English manner of living. They accepted its evils, but were unable to absorb its good. It was inevitable that they should perish.
CHAPTER III.
The Early Settlement
The early settlement of Worcester County was attended by long years of hardship and unceasing labor, discouragement and hope deferred, sorrow and tragedy. With indomitable will and energy, the English freeman, denied in his home country, was bound to establish for himself and his family a landed estate and home and a competence in a new world. The first settlers were pioneers, but, not as a rule, woodsmen. Many of them were only recently from the cultivated countrysides and long-established cities and towns of Old England. Here they found a virgin wilderness, untouched by man excepting as the Indians were cultivating a few acres of field here and there. They lived in utter isolation, even from the Bay Colony, itself still in its infancy.
The settlers were completely dependent upon themselves and the few belongings they were able to bring with them over the rude and narrow trails. They were compelled to live cheek and jowl, as it were, with their savage neighbors. In the forests about them were fierce and dangerous animals. There were panthers here then, and bears and packs of wolves, and other marauders against which their few domestic animals must be protected. In some regions they were compelled to wage constant warfare upon the ven- omous rattlesnake and copperhead, which invaded their fields and even their homestead areas. Insect foes were more than an annoyance; they were an affliction. Anyone who knows the swamps and forests of central New Eng- land can readily visualize the torments inflicted by the swarms of black flies in their season, and the mosquitoes all through the warm months. Their cabins had no protection against these pests, excepting as they were kept air- tight or filled with stifling smudge. And the long winter, their cabins buried in the drifts, and communication with all but nearest neighbors cut off per- haps for weeks at a time!
The Puritans were a hardy crew. Their motto might well have been, "Never say die!" To put it slangily, they were gluttons for punishment. In
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THE EARLY SETTLEMENT
the Nipmuck country, they labored mightily and long, built their houses and farm buildings, and, of course, a church; cleared the land, planted crops, lived with Spartan-like frugality, went hungry at times, until finally they had created a thriving little settlement. The Indians descended upon them, mas- sacred some, made captives of their wives and children, drove out the sur- vivors, burned their buildings to the ground, robbed them of everything.
Were they disheartened? No sooner had the smoke of war cleared away than they returned to the blackened ruins of their homes and rebuilt their settlements, bigger and better than before and established new ones. Again came the Indians, this time the northern tribes and their French allies, and killed a few of the English and led away captives and burned some buildings. But these stout-hearted Puritans did not yield. They were now experienced fighting men. They gave the invaders blow for blow. Their garrison houses, for the most part, proved impregnable. They held the frontier of the Mas- sachusetts Colony. Peace came again, and at last they received their reward. And in their prayers they took not one whit of credit to themselves. To their pious minds, it was all an act of Providence, and they the humble instruments !
But these later events came in the second period of the settlement of Wor- cester County. The first period, as we see it, opened in 1642, when the first Englishman built his cabin in the Nipmuck Country, and closed when the last of the English were driven from their settlements in 1676. In this interval were settled Lancaster, Mendon, Brookfield, and Worcester. Marlboro, too, settled in 1661, comes into the picture of Worcester County, for it then included the lands now occupied by the towns of Westboro, Northboro, and Southboro, and a number of families were living in Westboro.
Settlement of Lancaster-The first white resident of Worcester County was Thomas King, who established a trading post on George Hill in Lancaster in 1642. The Nashaway tribe occupied the Nashua Valley, to use the modern spelling, and had an important village at the junction of the North and South branches. Their chief was Sholan, who made the acquaintance of King at Watertown, took a fancy to him, and offered him a large tract of land if he would conduct a "trucking house" near the Nashaway village. The rea- son he gave was that his people wanted easy opportunity to trade their furs and other commodities for English goods. Probably a motive fully as impelling was the Sagamore's belief that the presence of Englishmen with their guns and their recognized skill in warfare would give his village immunity from the Mohawks and Mohegans, whose war parties had become active.
Wor .- 3
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King thought well of the proposition, for he must have seen profit in the trading and in the future value of the land. So Sholan formally deeded to him and a partner eighty square miles of territory, in consideration of f12, the instrument containing the provision that the purchasers should refrain from "molesting the Indians in their hunting, fishing and usual planting places." Such a clause was included in all the deeds of Indian lands. Look- ing forward, it was as if two groups of people were forever to occupy and use the same ground at the same time, a condition fruitful of ill will and trouble. Sholan and his fellow sachems naturally could not visualize his meadows occupied by a large and active community of Englishmen, and probably such a vision, if it appeared at all to King, was exceedingly nebulous.
Both King and his partner died, and in 1643 there appeared the Nash- away Company, organized to exploit the King grant. Its "undertakers," as its members were styled, were the founders of Lancaster, first settlement in Worcester County. Three Watertown men built cabins near the wading place of the North River in 1643. But John Prescott was regarded as the real founder of the town, and was so recognized by his fellow-citizens at the time of its incorporation in 1653. For they petitioned the General Court that the town should be named Prescott, which was denied, because, it is conjectured, Prescott, the village blacksmith, did not carry sufficient dignity and prestige to warrant such an honor. So they compromised on Lancaster, for the Eng- lish town where he was born.
In 1654 the settlement had grown to twenty families, and in that year came the first minister, Master Joseph Rowlandson, whose wife and children were destined to endure a long Indian captivity, the story of which will be told in due time. A church was built and organized, and a sawmill erected in 1658 by Major Simon Willard, who became a famous military leader in King Philip's War. He was the officer who, acting on his own initiative, and dis- regarding his orders from Boston, marched to the relief of beleaguered Brookfield, and rescued its garrison and townspeople from a swarm of determined savages. For this act, which probably prevented a massacre, the Major was reprimanded by his superior officers. Orders must be obeyed, said they, no matter what emergency of life or death might arise. In 1675, when the bloody war began, the Lancaster settlement had some 350 inhab- itants. It was much the largest in the Nipmuck Country.
Mendon, Brookfield, Worcester-The second settlement was made at Mendon. In 1660 the General Court granted to residents of Braintree the right to establish a plantation eight miles square, and they bought the Mendon lands from the sachems who had Indian title to them for twenty-four pounds sterling. The first record of the settlement shows that before July 7, 1663, seven families had taken up land and occupied it, and the next year the num-
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THE EARLY SETTLEMENT
ber had increased to fifteen. In 1669 the proprietors expressed their fears of a land famine by resolving "to take into this town but six more families." A minister was settled and a church built; a "corn mill" was erected and an inn opened. Yet when the year 1675 opened, Mendon had only thirty-four fam- ilies. Then came the raid of bloodthirsty half-Christianized Indians of the Praying Towns. "Blood was never shed in Massachusetts in the way of hos- tility before that day," wrote Cotton Mather. There was well-founded fear of further Indian attack, and the settlers withdrew to the safe side of the frontier.
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Brookfield was settled about 1665, when it is known five Englishmen had established themselves. Ipswich men had obtained from the Colony the required rights to hold land, and a tract six miles square was bought from the Quabaugs for "three hundred fathom of wapmuneage," Indian money of white sea-shells wrought into beads and strung, 360 to a fathom. Reduced to English money the price paid was about £75. Here, too, was the usual reservation as to Indian rights to hunt, fish and till the soil. About twenty families were living there in 1675, close neighbors of the Quaboag villages on the river.
The settlement of Worcester, fourth in order of the Nipmuck Country towns, proceeded slowly. The region of Quinsigamond had been explored, and the significance of its location midway between the Bay and Springfield was recognized. Hubbard's Narrative of the Indian Wars refers to it as "a village called Quonsigamog, in the middle way between Marlborough and Quabaog, consisting of six or seven houses."
Under the grant from the General Court there was no difficulty in effect- ing the purchase of a tract eight miles square from Woonaskochu, Sagamore of Tatassit, and Solomon, otherwise Hoorrawannonit, Sagamore of Paka- choag, the deed being signed July 13, 1674. The agreed price was £12, and a down payment was made of "two coats and four yards of trucking cloth valued at 26 shillings." The next year the two sagamores rose against their white neighbors, and would have wiped out the deed as well as the English if they had succeeded in their war of extermination.
The two first white settlers were Ephraim Curtis of Sudbury, and Daniel Gookin of Cambridge. Both built log houses in 1673, and tradition has it that Gookin was the first to occupy his wilderness home. But Curtis is always looked upon as the first settler of Worcester. He had previous ownership in the land through the purchase of an earlier grant. Gookin did not retain a residence. Land which Curtis owned during the settlement of Worcester has remained continuously in the possession of his descendants even to this day.
Both Ephraim Curtis and Daniel Gookin were conspicuous figures in Colonial affairs. Lieutenant Curtis was a famous scout in the Indian war,
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WORCESTER COUNTY
Gookin was made a major-general, and long before he became a proprietor of Quinsigamond had attained much prominence, particularly as superintendent of affairs affecting the Praying Indians. In that office he was an enthusiastic co-worker of John Eliot in the task of elevating the religious character and bettering the social conditions of the aborigines. Another of the first settlers was Captain Daniel Henchman, who later commanded a company which was a constant source of terror to the warring Nipmucks, Pocanokets and Narragansetts.
At the outbreak of Indian hostilities in the summer of 1675, Quinsiga- mond had only a handful of settlers. Probably all were men, making homes for their families. They were too few in number to sustain an attack in force by the savages and they abandoned their property until such time as they might live there in peace and quiet. On December 2 following their departure their old neighbors burned their houses to the ground.
It so happened that the four Worcester County settlements and Marl- boro were spaced wide apart. Strategically this was unfortunate, as it after- ward turned out, for when the Indian trouble came a beleagured garrison could not hope for quick succor. Taking Worcester as the center, Lancaster was eighteen miles to the northward, Marlboro fifteen miles to the eastward, Mendon seventeen miles to the southward, and Brookfield fifteen miles to the westward. If the effort had been made to set them as far apart as possible, the result could not have been much better.
The reason, of course, was the advantage each obtained from the natural excellence of its site. The explorers in seeking places suitable for settlement were confronted by three conditions-"conveniency of home-lots, meadow lots and planting fields." These they found in prodigal abundance at Lan- caster, and in the river country of Brookfield, and Worcester and Mendon had a sufficiency of the three qualifications. Of particular importance was the "conveniency of meadows." They were absolutely essential for the set- tler's income and support the first year of his occupancy. These bottom lands were exceedingly fertile and comparatively free from trees and under- growth. In them a wild grass grew thickly, "up to a man's face," wrote one explorer ; "some as high as the shoulders so that a good mower may cut three loads a day," wrote another. Cut while it was young, this grass was nutri- tious, and kept the cattle through the winter. For summer pasturage they were permitted to range the woods and commons, sometimes, if there was danger from wild beasts, guarded by a herdsman, but more often left to roam at will. The virgin soil of the uplands required no rotation of cultivated crops, and was planted with corn and rye year after year.
Division of Town Lands-In the orderly settling of a new town, an early and important matter was the division of the lands among the planters. The fee was commonly vested in the inhabitants as a body, which, either
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THE EARLY SETTLEMENT
through a committee or by corporate action, made distribution to individual engagers and families. The statutes provided no general rule of apportion- ment; each town established its own rules of equity. Usually, both persons and property were considered in making divisions. The head of the family and the older sons, and sometimes the wife and all the children were taken into account in estimating the needs of a household and its ability to cultivate the lands. Quite often the "home-lots" were equal in size, or put in two or four classes, representing wholes, halves and quarters; and the "meadow lots," and the proportions in "planting fields" varied according to pecuniary means and ability of labor. In the first Worcester County settlements the rule of division was simplified.
In Lancaster the apportionment was twenty acres each of upland for a home lot, twenty acres of intervale for planting, while the open tracts of grass lands was assigned on the basis of four acres per fioo of estate. The Mendon proprietors gave generously, each settler receiving thirty acres for a home lot, ten acres of meadow, five acres of swamp, and 105 acres "for great lotte" to each fioo of estate. In Brookfield each received twenty acres of home lot, and the same area of meadow, about half as much of plain land and forty acres of upland. In addition, undivided lands were held in common.
The proprietors of the Worcester grant divided up their lands into ninety lots of varying sizes, and these were grouped in six "squadrons" along the trail which later became the Boston-Worcester post-road, and on the route to Lancaster. The division called for the setting apart of the most convenient lot in the center of the town for the meetinghouse, a fifty-acre lot for the "first minister as near the church as might be; another lot in the next con- venient place, not far from thence for the ministry that should succeed in all future times, twenty-five acres for a training field and to build a school house upon; a lot of twenty-five acres for the maintenance of a school and schoolmaster, and two hundred and fifty acres for the use of the country."
The early settlers seemed to have labored in the fear that their townships would. become overpopulated, and that there would not be land enough to support properly all the inhabitants. In their early records we find them "resolving" that only so many additional families should be admitted to resi- dence. But this illusion was dissipated after a while, and the settlements were permitted to take their normal course of increase.
Overcoming the Wilderness-In order truly to vizualize the early years of these settlements it is necessary to erase from the mind the picture of the prosperous towns and villages and farmlands with which we are now familiar. On these same lands in the middle years of the seventeenth cen- tury were a few scattered clusters of log cabins set in clearings where no time or labor had been wasted in creating even a semblance of orderliness.
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There were no broad cultivated fields, only patches of a few acres here and there planted with corn and beans and squash, the mainstays of the Indians, and such other crops as English people might venture. In places the corn was planted in the forest itself, but a leafless, shadeless forest, robbed of its verdure by the simple process of girdling the tree and thus killing them, a trick learned from the natives. Neighbors traveled back and forth between their cabins in paths which existed only because of the trampling of their feet. No road existed anywhere. No wheeled vehicle, so far as known, ever entered the Nipmuck country previous to King Philip's War. There were Indian trails connecting the settlements simply because they happened to be close to Indian villages.
In the beginning pack horses and men's backs were the only means of con- veyance. When continued use broadened the trails, some of the settlers hauled in their goods while there was still snow on the ground on sleds drawn by oxen. Live stock was driven in front of the sleds or pack-horses. There were no bridges and at times of freshet some of the streams were impassable. An occasional venturesome traveler lost his life trying to cross wild waters. The experience of John Prescott was typical. He left Water- town for Lancaster with his family in the spring of 1645, his household goods packed on horses. Attempting to ford Sudbury River he lost a horse and its lading, and his wife and children on another horse were barely saved from drowning. He was compelled to abandon the journey.
Some of the settlers left their families in the Bay villages during the first season of settlement, which they devoted to building house and barn and putting fields in shape for the next year's planting.
The sturdy Puritans kept busy. In each community there came together men of various trades-blacksmith and gunsmith, carpenter and brickmaker, millwright and perhaps a potter, and so on. Each contributed to the welfare and progress of the whole. Gristmill and sawmill were built. Log cabins were replaced by timber houses, and occasionally one of brick or stone. Such a building was the Rowlandson house in Lancaster, which was con- verted into a garrison house. Unfortunately, its essential defensive features were not perfected, and when the attack came in February, 1676, it with- stood the Indians only a few hours.
Later the English settlers learned better how to make a blockhouse. Those in which they sought safety in King Philip's War were as a rule not wholly bullet proof. The garrison house at Brookfield, filled with soldiers and the people of the settlement, appears to have been riddled by the gunfire of the besieging Nipmucks. The improved type had sills, posts, girders and plates of heavy hewn timbers. Instead of studs in the lower story, logs split in half were set upright, face and back alternately, so as to match by over- lapping the edges, and sometimes planks were similarly used. The space
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THE EARLY SETTLEMENT
under the windows was filled in with brick or heavy planking. The lathing was fastened with wooden pegs to the logs on the inside, and boarding in like manner on the outside. The doors were of heavy planks, and the windows had equally stout inside shutters.
The second story set out from the line of the lower walls, permitting the defenders to shoot down on attackers, or to pour boiling water upon them. Within the house access to the second story was confined to a ladder which could be drawn up and the opening made tight, so that in last resort, should the Indians gain entrance below, the defenders would still be able to continue the fight and hold out, perhaps, until help arrived. Some blockhouses had bullet-proof watch-towers on the roof.
Fear of Raiding Mohawks-In the early years of the Worcester County settlements there was little apprehension of attack from their Nip- muck neighbors. But the Mohegans of Connecticut had periodically raided the Nipmucks; and feared most of all the fierce Mohawks of the valley which bears their name, who were natural enemies of the Connecticut River tribes. Their war parties sometimes got into the Quaboag and other Nip- muck country, and the whites knew that these savages would like nothing better than the conquest and looting of an English settlement.
In 1647, three Indians living at Quaboag Old Fort were killed by maraud- ing Naunotuks and a few Maquas, and the next spring a murderous raid was made on an out-settlement of the Quaboags on the Ware River, probably in Barre, when five of them were killed and their wigwams robbed.
In 1661 a war party of Mohegans, under Oneko, son of Uncas, made a surprise attack upon the Quaboags, killing three and carrying away six cap- tives. The pretended motive was retaliation against Onopequin, a native of Quaboag, but then living at Pacomptuck, who in the spring of 1658 had led a war party into the Mohegan country and killed and captured several of the people of Uncas. According to the explanation offered by Uncas to the white authorities it was a case of an eye for an eye.
In 1664 the Mohawks came close to Brookfield and Lancaster. They entered the Connecticut Valley in force, destroyed the native fort at Deer- field and inflicted great injury on the Pacomptucks and neighboring tribes. The raid extended into the Nashua and Merrimack country, and for several weeks their scouting parties were raiding the Nipmuck and Nashaway villages.
The settlers were fortunate in having no enemy to the north of them. The Merrimack Indians declined to enter into any alliance to attack the English. Their attitude was attributed entirely to the farewell message to his people of their famous old chief Passaconaway, delivered to them at a great festival of the tribe, in which he said: "I am now going the way of all flesh, am ready to die and not likely to see you ever met together any more.
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WORCESTER COUNTY
I will now leave this word of counsel with you, that you take heed how you quarrel with the English, for though you may do them much mischief, yet assuredly you will all be destroyed and rooted off the earth if you do. For I was as much an enemy to the English at their coming into these parts as any- one whatsoever, and did try all ways and means possible to have destroyed them, at least to have prevented them sitting down here, but I could in no way effect it. Therefore I advise you never to contend with the English, nor make war with them."
So, when the uprising came, his son and successor, Wonolancet, heeded the wise words, and his tribesmen were never accused of enmity to the whites.
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