USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Bremen > A history of the towns of Bristol and Bremen in the state of Maine : including the Pemaquid Settlement > Part 6
USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Bristol > A history of the towns of Bristol and Bremen in the state of Maine : including the Pemaquid Settlement > Part 6
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Boston, 11th September, 1755. SAMUEL WELLES."1
The author of this statement was a native of Connecticut, but lived in Boston, where he was held in high estimation, and often appointed to offices of great trust and responsibility. We may believe that he would not make such a declaration without due consideration, nor without evidence satisfactory to himself of its truth; but that John Peirce, after holding the relation he did to the Pilgrim Fathers, could come to this country, and even undertake to found a permanent settlement on the coast, no farther than this from the Plymouth settlement, and the fact entirely escape mention in contemporary history, until the middle of the last century, is extremely improbable. The language of Mr. Welles plainly implies that his information was derived chiefly, if not entirely, from Peirce's descendants ; and even with them it was preserved by tradition, only except so far as evidence was furnished by the patent itself.
But Richard Pearce (this appears to have been his way of spelling the name), who is conceded to have been a son of John Peirce, did establish himself here as one of the very earliest permanent settlers of the place, and left quite a numerous posterity, of whom we shall have something to say in the pro- gress of this work. John Brown, whose daughter he married, purchased land here of the Indians, in July, 1625, but how long he had been in the place we do not know; nor can we now tell whether Pearce's intimate relationship with the Brown family began before their immigration to this country. The proba- bility seems to be that they all came together, and it may be they came in an expedition sent out by Pearce's father, imme-
IWill, That. Portiond, 2d ed., p. 22. Manuscripts in Archives of the Maine Hist. Society.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
diately after the second disastrous return of his ship, the Par- ragon, in 1623. The fact that Brown afterwards purchased the same land from the Indians makes nothing against this view.
When the patent of June 1st, 1621, was issued in the name of John Peirce and his associates, it was intended to be for the benefit of the colony then recently established at Plymouth, Mass .; there can be no question of this. When therefore it is recited in the patent, "that whereas the said John Peirce and his Associates haue transported and vndertaken to transporte at their cost and chardges themselves and dyvers psons into New England and there to erect and build a Towne, &c.," it was the beginning of the Plymouth colony that was referred to.
There can be no escape from this, though some have supposed that the language may have referred to another settlement pre- viously begun here by Peirce. But if there may have been, in former times, some reason for such a suspicion, the matter has been set at rest by the publication of fragments of the records of the Council for New England, by the American Antiquarian Society.1
We may, indeed, suppose that two patents were issued the same day, in the name of John Peirce, in trust; one for Ply- mouth, and the other for a settlement elsewhere. But this is too improbable to be thought of for a moment.
Mr. Welles says further that " some time after Peirce's settle- ment here was begun, one Mr. Brown made a purchase of a large tract of land of the natives; and as Mr. Peirce's was the most ancient grant thereabouts, they united the grant from home with the purchase from the natives, &c."
But Mr. Welles was not the author of this ingenious mode of representing these transactions; it had been adopted by the Peirces, as early as 1734. But probably we shall best regard it as an afterthought, adopted by them to strengthen their supposed claim to a proprietary interest in the lands here, by virtue of the irregular transactions of their ancestors.
Thus John Brown -third of the name -in a quit-claim deed to several of the Pearce family, Sept. 10, 1734, says: "To all people to whom these presents shall come ;- John Brown of New Harbor, in the county of York, yeoman, sendeth greeting, &c. Whereas my Hond. Grandfather, John Brown of said New Harbor, Deceasd., in his Life Time stood seized of a Large Tract
! Proc. Am. Ant. Soc., 1867, pp. $5, 88 and 91.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
of Land at and adjoining to st New Harbor by Purchase of Capt. John Summersett, &c., Indian Sachems, as por their Deed Dated the 15th Day of July, 1625, a Part of which Lands my said Grandfather gave to his Son-in-Law, Richard Pearce of Mar- blehead, Decd ; and Instead of giving a Deed of said land to said Peirce he allowed the said Sachem to give a Deed of the Land to his Son-in-Law, as per the Deed of said Sachem, Summersett [9th] Day of January, 1641. Bounded, beginning at Round Pond Falls, Extending North West four miles and so back to Pema- quid River, which said Bounds Trench Partly on the Bounds of said New Harbor Purchase, which said Purchase since the Death of my said Grand-father, and the Death of my Hond. Father John Brown late of Damariscotta has been divided, &c."1
The fact is well established, that Brown did fully assent to the sale of the land referred to - a part of his own tract -- to his son-in-law Pearce, and by the same Indian sachem, Samoset, who sold it to him sixteen years before, for his name appears as a witness on the deed ;2. but not a word in it indicates that he, at the time, had any such thoughts as the interpretation after- ward put on the transaction supposed. Is it not more probable that he considered the deed his son-in-law was receiving from the " untutored savages " as of even less consequence than his own previous deed ?
But the fact that a son of John Peirce, in whose name the first Plymouth patent was issued, became a permanent resident here, at so early a period, coupled with the fact that the Ply- mouth people were greatly displeased with his father's doings, and charged him with managing their affairs in view of selfish ends of his own, must be considered as very significant. The Plymouth people did not confide in his integrity.
It is said that in 1623, without consulting his associates, he obtained another charter or patent ostensibly for the Plymouth colony, but containing certain provisions designedly favoring his own selfish ends, and those of his family. It is not now extant, and what its special provisions were is not known, but it was characterized in severe terms by Bradford and others. Subsequently, May 18th, 1623, the matter was settled by the payment to Peirce of £500, by the company ; but it is evident that it was not done without some bad feeling between the parties.
1 York Records, vol. XVI, p. 15. Files in possession of Maine Hist. Society.
2 Hist. and Gen. Reg., XIII, p. 365.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
Did Peirce immediately after this send his son Richard to this place, accompanied perhaps by Brown and others, with the view of establishing another settlement under the patent ? This seems probable; but no public announcement was ever made of such a transaction. Still, it may have been that those were the very men who had taken possession of Pemaquid, and of whom Samoset and other Indians of the place informed Levett, at Capmanwagen (Southport), late in the autumn of the same year, 1623.1 But no evidence has been found that Peirce ever intimated an intention to make such a use of the patent of June 1st, 1621; and more important still, so far as we know, his son Richard, during his lifetime here, never put forward any claim based upon the provisions of that charter !
Some points in the character and history of the patent are decidedly curious :
First. No metes or bounds are mentioned in it, but Peirce and his associates were authorized to take possession anywhere between the 40th and 48th degrees of north latitude, with only some restrictions in regard to other settlements, &c. It might, therefore, have been located here without any violation of its own express provisions.
Second, the said patent, so far as we can now learn, after being sent to Gov. Carver (who, however, died before its arrival), the same year it was given, was never in the possession of John Pierce, or his son Richard, nor was it ever brought to Pema- quid, or Muscongus, where Richard Pearce lived.
Third. The earliest date at which this patent of June 1, 1621, is mentioned by the descendants of Richard Pearce, as the foundation, in whole or in part, for their claim to lands in this place, so far as has been discovered, is that above given in John Brown's quit-claim deed to several of the Pearces, Sept. 10th, 1734. Several deeds of lands at Pemaquid, of an earlier date, are to be found on the York County Records, given by persons styling themselves " grand-children of Richard Pearce and great-grand-children of John Brown" of Pemaquid, but they mention only, as the foundation of their claims, the pur- chase from the Indians in 1625, and the " deed of gift" of John Brown to his daughter, Mrs. Richard Pearce, omitting entirely any allusion to the patent of 1621.
1 Maine Hist. Coll., II, p. 88.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
Fourth. The patent referred to seems to have been in the custody of the Plymouth people, a whole century and more, without receiving any special attention, or exciting particular inquiry; but, in 1727 great search was made for it, and it could not be found. Again in 1733, 1739, and 1741, the search was renewed in Plymouth, Ipswich and Cambridge, but without success. At length, it is said Perez Bradford, by request, consented to aid in the search, and after considerable exertion brought it to light; and the fact was ascertained that it had been " designedly concealed."1
May not the document have fallen into the hands of some one of the heirs of Richard Pearce, who was carefully preserv- ing it in order to strengthen the family claim to a proprietary interest in the lands here, when the time should come for the settlement of the question ? Nevertheless, when the settlement was actually made, early in the present century, as we shall hereafer see, only very slight reference was made to the patent by one or two of the claimants in the Peirce interest, and the commissioners seem to have given it little, if any, attention.
The purchase of land at Pemaquid of the Indians by John Brown, constitutes an important epoch in the history of the place. He probably came here directly from Bristol, Eng. ; and the following document, copied from the records of that city, makes us acquainted with some items of his history.
" Feb. 21, 1658, Robert Allen of Sheepscott River in New Eng- land, planter, came personally before me, etc., etc., that for 17 years last past he well knew John Brown of New Harbor in New England, mason, who often told him that he was the son of Richard Brown of Barton Regis, in Gloucester, in England, and that he married Margaret, daughter of Francis Hayward of Bristol. Said Brown was alive and in good health in New England last June."3
The Indian deed to Brown is as follows :1
" To all people whom it may concern. Know ye, that I Capt. John Somerset and Unongoit, Indian sagamores, they being the proper heirs to all the lands on both sides of Muscongus river, have bargained and sould
1 Willis, Hist. Portland, p. 22, 2d ed. Hinman's Catalogue of First Settlers in Connecticut, p. 271, note. Plainly, Hinman did not understand the merits of the case. " From H. G. Somerby, of Boston, the well known antiquarian, who himself made the copy from the Bristol records.
' Two words illegible, but supposed to indicate occupation.
Lincoln Report, 1811, p. 106. Files of the Muine Hist. Soc.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
to John Brown of New Harbor this certain tract or parcell of land as fol- loweth, that is to say, beginning at Pemaquid Falls and so running a direct course to the head of New Harbour, from thence to the south end of Muscongus Island, taking in the island, and so running five and twenty miles into the country north and by east, and thence eight miles north west and by west, and then turning and running south and by west to Pemaquid where first begun - To all which lands above bounded, the said Captain John Somerset and Unnongoit, Indian Sagamores have granted and made over to the above said John Brown, of New Harbour, in and for consideration of fifty skins, to us in hand paid, to our full satisfaction, for the above mentioned lands, and we the above said sagamores do bind our- selves and our heirs forever to defend the above said John Brown and his heirs in the quiet and peaceable possession of the above said lands. In witness whereunto, I the said Capt. John Somerset and Unnongoit have set our hands and seals this fifteenth day of July, in the year of our Lord God one thousand six hundred and twenty-five.
CAPT. JOHN SOMERSET, [SEAL. ] UNNONGOIT. [SEAL.]
Signed and sealed in presence of us,
MATTHEW NEWMAN, WM. Cox.
July 24, 1626, Capt. John Somerset and Unnongoit, Indian Sagamores, personally appeared and acknowledged this instrument to be their act and deed, at Pemaquid, before me, ABRAHAM SHURTE,
Charlestown, December 26, 1720, Read, and at the request of James Stilson, and his sister Margaret Hilton, formerly Stilson, they being claimers and heirs of said lands, accordingly entered.
PER SAMUEL PHIPPS, One of the Clerks of the Committee for Eastern Lands."
The two witnesses to this deed were probably men who had come with Brown from England, but nothing is now known of the first, Matthew Newman.1 Wm. Cox became a resident of the place ; and his posterity of the same name are still here. The late Capt. Israel Cox, who many years occupied a place on the board of selectmen of the town of Bristol, and died only a few years ago, claimed that this Wm. Cox was his great-grand- father's father. He continued to reside here, but the time of his death is not known. All of the name of Cox now in this
1 It is remarkable that thirty-five years after this transaction, that is, in the year 1660, the same names, Matthew Newman and Win. Cox, appear as witnesses to & deed from John Brown of New Harbor to Sander Gould and his wife, who was Brown's daughter. Lincoln Report, 1811, p. 121, 123.
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
region, and on the Kennebec, are believed to have descended from him ; and it may be further added, that of all the settlers who came here from this period until the close of the century, when the place was destroyed by the Indians, the names of Cox and Hilton appear to be the only ones now perpetuated in the place
Brown lived near New Harbor, and is therefore in the old records frequently called John Brown of New Harbor; but being a man of great enterprise, in 1639 he purchased more land of the Indians at a place called Naquassett (now Woolwich) on the Kennebec river, and removed there. In the year 1641, his name appears as a witness to an Indian deed of lands at Muscongus to his son-in-law, Richard Pierce, the land being a part of the same he had purchased of the Indians in 1625. We have already seen the interpretation given to this transaction by Peirce's descendants.
In 1646, he sold his lands at Nequasset, and returned to Pemaquid; but in 1654 he was living at Damariscotta, "Phillips, Taylor, and Scott being his neighbors." By some it is added that he died in 1670, probably at Damariscotta; but according to a deposition of Benjamin Prescott, of Danvers, made in Salem, in 1765, be lived with his son, John Brown, Jr., at Boston, the last years of his life."
These four, John Brown, John Taylor, Walter Phillips, and Robert Scott, were the only men having families who then lived at Damariscotta " Salt Water Falls," where the bridge now is. Scott lived on the east side directly opposite the " great bank of oyster shells," and Brown's House was south of him ; Phillips and Taylor lived on the west side. During the war, called King Philips' war, about the year 1676, they were all obliged to make their escape, in the best way they could.
Brown left three children, John Brown, Jr., and two daughters, Margaret, who married Sander or Alexander Gould, and long resided in the place, and Elizabeth, who married Richard Peirce or Pearce.
The acknowledgement of this deed, it will be observed, was made before Abraham Shurte at Pemaquid, only a year after it was given. Shurte does not append any title to his name, and
1 Files Maine Hist. Soc. The Indian deed referred to is published in the N. E. Ilist. & Gen. Reg., vol. XII, p. 305.
2 Lincoln, Rep., 1816, p. 115, 116. Files Maine Hist. Soc.
₹
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
probably claimed no authority for such an act, but made the record as a matter of accommodation in a new settlement, far removed from any regularly appointed magistrates, leaving it for those whom it might afterwards concern to attach such im- portance to it as might seem just and proper.
" The precision and conciseness of this first deed of convey- ance of American soil, written at Pemaquid, and the neat and compact formula of acknowledgement, drawn up by Abraham Shurte, and still adhered to in New England, word for word, are interesting to the jurist. There was no precedent for the acknowledgement, or the formula, and Mr. Shurte is well en- titled to be remembered as the father of American conveyancing. The first legislation of Massachusetts, providing for this mode of authenticating deeds, did not occur until 1640, when commis- sioners were especially appointed for the purpose, and Plymouth colony. did not adopt this security against fraudulent convey- ances until six years later, in 1646.1
This deed was not recorded for nearly a hundred years, and was then entered on the records at Charlestown, Mass.
Shurte gives quite a history of himself and some of his doings in the following deposition, given by him, Dec. 25th 1662.
" The Deposition of Abraham Shurte, aged fourscore years, or thereabouts, saith ---
That in the year 1626, Alderman Alsworth [often written Aldsworth], and Mr. Gyles Elbridge of Bristol, merchants sent over this Deponent, for their Agent, and gave power to him to buy Monhegan, which then belonged to Mr. Abraham Jennings of Plimouth, who they understood was willing to sell ; and having conference with his agent, about the price thereof; agreed to fifty pounds, and the patent to be delivered up; and gave him a bill upon Alderman Alsworth; which bill being presented, was paid, as the aforesaid wrote me. The Deponent further saith, that about the year 1629, was sent over unto him by the aforenamed Alderman Alsworth, and Mr. Eldbridge a patent granted by the Patentees, for twelve thousand acres of land at Pemaquid, with all islands, islets adjacent, within three leagues ; and for the delivery was appointed Captain Walter Neale, who gave me possession thereof; and bounded the twelve thousand
1 Thornton, Maine Hist. Coll., v, p. 195. Mr. Thornton has since learned that the same form was in use in the mother country, long before Shurte's day. (Letter to Author.)
8
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HISTORY OF BRISTOL AND BREMEN.
acres for the use above named, from the head of the river of Damariscotta, to the head of the river of Muscongus, and be- tween it, to the sea. Moreover it was granted by the same patent ; that every servant, that they, Alderman Aldsworth and Mr. Eldbridge did send over, one hundred acres of land and to every one there born fifty acres of land, for the term of the first seven years ; and to be added to the former twelve thousand acres .- Likewise this Deponent saith, that Domanriscove was included, and belonging to Pernaquid ; it being an island, situ- ate, and lying within three leagues of Pemaquid Point ; and some years after Mr. Thomas Eldbridge coming to Pemaquid, to whom the patent by possession did belong, and appertain, called a Court, unto which divers of the then inhabitants of Monhegan and Damariscove repaired, and continued their fishing, paying a certain acknowledgement-and further saith not.
Sworn the 25th December, 1662, by ABRAHAM SHURTE, Before me RICHARD RUSSELL, Magistrate."1
According to Mr. Thornton," Mr. Jennens, with others, had made considerable purchases of land in New England from the Plymouth council, as early as 1622 ; and probably it was under the title thus acquired that he claimed to hold the island of Mon- hegan. Jennens himself, so far as we know, had never visited this country, but a very considerable business had been transacted on the island in his name, for, when it was known at the new settlement at Plymouth, Mass., that his establishment was to be discontinued, Gov. Bradford and Mr. Winslow, with several others proceeded there to make purchases. Stopping at Pisca- taqua on their way, Mr. David Thompson took passage with them, being anxious also to make purchases. In order to avoid the evils of two great competition between the two parties, they agreed to purchase all the goods offered, and to divide them equally between them. They also purchased "a parcell of goats." The purchases of Gov. Bradford amounted to about £400 Sterling. The same Spring a French ship had been cast away at Sagadahoc, but many goods were saved, and for sale
1 Lincoln Report, 1811, p. 40.
2 Maine Hist. Coll., v, p. 109, 170.
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among the fishermen at Damariscove and Monhegan, of which the Gov. purchased to the amount of another hundred pounds.1
Shurte became a resident at Pemaquid soon after his arrival in the country, and spent here the rest of his life. Nearly all his life he was actively engaged in business, often extending his trad- ing expedition as far west as Massachusetts, and as far cast as Nova Scotia. In one of his excursions he came near losing bis life by the recklessness of a seaman, who was so addicted to smoking that he could not forego the use of his pipe for small reasons. He was on his way to Boston, in a small vessel com- manded by Capt. Wright. As they were entering the harbor at Piscataqua a seaman in attempting to light his pipe near a keg of gunpowder, exploded the powder, blowing the vessel as well as himself to atoms. Shurte with the others escaped with little or no injury. He is always spoken of as having been a magistrate of influence in the colony, but it does not now appear from what source his authority was derived. It is probable that the excellent influence he exercised was due more to his elevated character as a just and upright man, than to his civil authority. The Indians he always treated justly and kindly, and thus maintained their friendship and re- spect, even when they were enraged against others.
In the summer of the year 1631, near a hundred of the Eastern Indians, in thirty canoes, made their way to the west, as far as Agawam [Ipswich, Mass. ], and fell suddenly upon the Indians there, killing several, and carrying into captivity, with others, the wife of one of their Sagamores. Through the medi- tation of Shurte of Pemaquid, she was afterwards restored to the chief; and thus probably was laid the foundation for the friendship ever afterwards shown him.2
It is not known that Shurte left any family. Being eighty years of age in 1662, it is probable that he soon afterwards passed away.3 Nothing is really known of him after this date, but it is altogether probable that he ended his days at Pemaquid, where he had been so long known as an honest man and an upright magistrate.
14 Mass. Hist. Coll., vol. III, p. 208.
" Hubbard. Muss. Hist. Coll., [2], v, p. 145. Lewis, Hist. of Lynn, p. 75, 2d ed.
3 Lincoln Rep., 1811, p. 40. Will, Hist. Maine, I, p. 602. Williamson, on the page last quoted, says that Shurte died at Pemaquid about 1680, but on page 004, he mentions 1690, as the year of his death. Both dates are probably erroneous. See also Hist. Gen. Reg., xxv, p. 131.
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CHAPTER LX.
The two Indian sagamores, Samoset and Unongoit - Pemaquid the centre of business on the coast -- Beginnings of other settlements in the vicinity -The first fort at Pemaquid -- Traders and pirates on the coast -- Dixy Bull -Mills at the Falls.
Of the two Sagamoies whose names appear on the deed of Brown, one, Samoset, is very well known in the history of the time, but the memory of the other, Ungonoit, except his mere name, has utterly perished. Indeed, this seems to be the only instance in which even his name occurs, or it may be that he was known by other names which, we are not able now to identify.
Samoset 1 has left behind him a name which is every way honorable and interesting. The first we hear of him is at Ply- mouth, March 16th, 1621, where he was the first to welcome " The Pilgrim Fathers " to the inhospitable shores of Massachu- setts. Though they landed, as we know, in December, the na- tives feared and avoided them ; and, until this time, held no intercourse with them. Indeed, few had been seen, and they were altogether hostile. The account of Samoset's meeting with them is as follows :
" This morning [Friday, March 16, 1621,] we determined to conclude of the military orders, which we had begun to consider before, but were interrupted by the savages. And whilst we were busied hereabout, we were interrupted again ; for there presented himself a savage, which caused an alarm. He very boldly came all alone, and along the houses, straight to the rendez-vous ; where we intercepted him, not suffering him to go in, as undoubtedly he would out of his boldness. He saluted usin English, and bade us ' Welcome,' for he had learned some broken English among the Englishmen that came to fish at Monhiggon (Monhegan), and knew by name the most of the captains, commanders, and masters that usually come. He was a man free in speech, so far as he could express his mind, and of a seemly carriage. We questioned him of many things; he was the first savage we could meet withall.
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