USA > Maine > Somerset County > Embden > Embden town of yore : olden times and families there and in adjacent towns > Part 11
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feet and weighed 240 pounds, without being corpulent. He had a stern appearance and a voice that sounded as though he meant what he said. It was told of him that he "would smile at a joke but seldom laughed out loud."
Fairfield Williams, his son, attended the public schools of Embden and Anson, after which he was several terms at Anson Academy when those Somerset attorneys, S. J. Wal- ton of Skowhegan, and J. J. Parlin of North Anson, were ---- students there. At 16, he joined the Free Will Baptist "UNCLE LEM" WILLIAMS Church, and in July, 1863, with his brother, John, was drafted for three years of war service, but paid the exemption, just after he had married Hannah Cragin. "Any one would have paid," said he long afterward, "if they had as nice a girl as I got when I married." During his long residence in Embden he served the town on the school board for six years. For 30 years and more and into his wonderful old age his work has been largely taking orders for nursery stock at which he has become a familiar figure with Somerset farmers.
Other men and women of capable careers came from Lieut. Lemuel Williams' huge family. One of his grandsons was Har- ris Williams, recently deceased, after a long business career at North Anson. Viola Berry, of Embden, was his second wife. Dr. Charles C. Williams, (1855-1928) of Los Angeles, but formerly of North Anson, was a half-brother of Harris, both being sons of William Williams. Dr. Williams began his life work as an ap- prentice in the Union Advocate office, worked at the printer's trade in Boston while in his teens, was graduated at the Massa- chusetts College of Pharmacy in 1881, held offices in the college corporation, including trustee, registrar and vice-president,
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studied at the Harvard Medical School and, after his graduation, practiced medicine in Boston before moving to California. He has written a monumental history of the Williams family in recent years.
Old Jacob Williams, of northeast Embden - farmer, fisher- man, moose hunter, captain of militia and town official - and his good wife, Joanna Dean (1764-1844) also born a Williams, were not a whit behind Lieut. Lemuel and Anna, their cousins two generations removed. They, too, raised a strapping family. The number of their grandchildren seems unrecorded but there were many of them in Embden, Concord, Caratunk and the wide world beyond.
Jacob, too, was of the Revolution. He enlisted at Easton, Mass., when a little more than 16 years old. His first station was at Dorchester Heights till the British army departed from Boston. Then he was marched away to New York and carried a musket thru the campaign in that vicinity. His service was relatively brief, for in 1779 when 19, he married Joanna, his dis- tant cousin, and in 1781 they obtained passage on a sailing ves- sel from Barnstable up the Kennebec to Fort Western (Augusta). This ship was carrying supplies for the fort. From Augusta, Jacob conveyed his wife and only son, Caleb (1780-1856) and whatever household goods he had, by row boat as far as Cara- tunk Falls. There a year or so previously he had located on a fine intervale.
Almost from the day of their arrival Jacob lived on the fat of the land and became one of the wealthiest farmers on the Up- per Kennebec. Salmon were so plentiful in the river that set- tlers could cross from bank to bank by stepping on their backs. So the fisherman said. One evening, while at supper, Jacob saw through his cabin door a moose loping over the intervale. He shot the moose in his tracks without leaving the supper table. So early Embden hunters said, in an item about the good supply of meat Jacob thus obtained for his young family.
Widow Joanna survived her husband by 30 years and was long represented on the Embden tax lists with substantial as- sessments. Applying for a Revolutionary War pension in 1828, she cited his services in her affidavit, adding "that she bore and
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raised up 15 children for her said husband." By way of con- firmation she attached a list with the day and date when each was born. It may be seen to this day in the Pension Office at Washington. Joanna's children, as she presented the list to the government were:
Caleb, born Monday, July 10, 1780.
Daniel, born Monday, July 22, 1782.
John, born Friday, August 20, 1784.
Richard, born Sunday, Feb. 4, 1787.
Isaac, born Monday, June 15, 1789. Elsa, born Saturday, Aug. 6, 1791.
Ebenezer, born Wednesday, July 17, 1793.
Hezia, born Wednesday, April 27, 1795.
Cyrus, born Thursday, April 21, 1796. Francis, born Aug. 27, 1798.
Sukey, born Tuesday, Feb. 19, 1801.
Jacob, born Tuesday, March 16, 1802.
Chandler, born Wednesday, June 6, 1804.
Leonard, born Sunday, Nov. 2, 1806.
Sarah, born Saturday, July 27, 1809.
The early deaths of Hezia, Sukey and Leonard (1806-1830) - who sleeps with his father in a private cemetery on the old farm - reduced this Williams family in Embden to twelve. There were two surviving daughters. Elsa (1791-1862) married Benjamin Atwood who operated the Jacob Williams mill till he moved to Concord. Benjamin and Elsa are the ancestors of many Atwoods including Stillman H. and S. Colby Atwood of Embden. Her sister, Sarah (1809-1837) was Mrs. Theodore Hamblet. He belonged to a staunch old pioneer family of Concord and Solon.
Most of the twelve sons of Jacob and Joanna Dean Williams resided in Embden after they married. Between 1817 and 1841 at least ten of these sons - Caleb, Daniel, John, Richard, Isaac, Ebenezer, Cyrus, Francis, Jacob, Jr., and Chandler - were Embden tax-payers and voters for varying periods. Their families near the Kennebec rivaled in numbers and capable in- dividuals the Clevelands on the western side. But there was a notable difference in that more of the Williamses remained in
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town, even though their contribution to the population of newer states was large.
This held of Caleb (1780-1856) and his wife, Elizabeth (Whit- man) Williams (1781-1856) and their household. The Caleb Williams family thus became a predominating one in neighbor- hoods along the river, related by marriage to the Eameses, Mc- Faddens, Berrys, Rowes, Ayers, Stevenses, Atkinses and Withams - all Embden names. These sons and daughters were :
Polly (1805-1889), the wife of Jonathan D. Eames; Zachariah (1809-1898), whose first wife was Sarah A. McFadden (1810- 1842) daughter of John, with Mrs. Nancy (Berry) Wells (1816) as his second; Amos (1811) who married Albina Rowe, daughter of Paul of Concord; Foster (1813-1884), whose wife was Elsie Ayer (1816) daughter of Stephen; Warren (1814), whose wife was Sarah Ann Lewis; Abigail (1817) who married William H. Stevens, son of the older Jonathan and had Caroline, Adeline, Cordelia and Milford Stevens; Albert (1822), who won Ellen Atkinson (1835) of middle Embden and went west; Cyrena (1824) who married Jotham G. Witham.
Caleb Williams, quite as much as any of his brothers, grew to the place of local influence his father had enjoyed. He bought land adjoining his father's farm and lived out his days in that neighborhood. His ownership of the Caratunk Falls farm long preceded the day when the potential value of the water rights there came to be realized. The town honored him with the best offices it could bestow.
Caleb's sons were like him, men of character and industry .. Zachariah, much respected among his townsmen, resided later at North Anson. His children by both marriages were largely daughters. Cornelia (1822-1860), wife of Bradford Stevens; with a son, Marshall Stevens, of Bath now deceased; Lucy E. (1836-1901) Mrs. Charles McIntyre of Solon; and Elizabeth (1839) who was Mrs. Orin O. Vittum of Solon were by Zachariah's first marriage. His family by Widow Nancy Wells included Matilda (1843) wife of Cyrus Boothby Stevens who went to Herman, Grant County, Minn .; Sarah (1845) who was Mrs. Almon Felker; Harriet T. (1847-1877) a very successful school teacher who married Henry B. Merry, of North Anson ;
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Maryetta (1852-1914) who was Mrs. Zina Norton; and Webster Williams (1856), Nancy's youngest son. He was associated in business with Henry Merry and now resides at Norridgewock. He is widely known for his ownership of blooded horses that have won ribbons at many New England fairs. Webster mar-
AMOS WILLIAMS
ALBINA ROWE WILLIAMS
ried (1) Mary Lawrence, (2) Sylvia L. Pullen and (3) Mrs. Lana (Record) Salley.
Amos Williams, son of Caleb, was a substantial farmer of northeast Embden. His marriage with a granddaughter of Abraham Rowe brought many descendant families of Embden and Concord into his immediate circle. His children married into the oldest established households of that part of the town. The children of Amos and Albina Williams were: Celestia (1841) Mrs. Jerome Spaulding of Embden and San Francisco with a daughter, Hadeena May (1869) ; Marshall (1845-1923) of Solon, whose wife was Eunice Healy of Concord; Esther (1846) who married Milton Malbon of Skowhegan; Effie (1850) who married Charles Drew, of Solon; Freeman (1852) who
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married Naomi, daughter of Elam Stevens, and resides at Haverhill, Mass .; Fred (1856-1894) ; Mae (1858) who was the wife of Fred Flagge; and Flora S. (1862), the widow of John E. Walker. She is a cultured and interesting woman, now residing with her son, Roy Walker, on the farm that adjoins the Amos Williams place.
Warren Williams dwelt at one period near the Caratunk Falls. There were ten children in his family - Joseph of Skowhegan, David of Hamilton, Ont., Eugene, Hattie, Rose, Ellen, Albert, Mellen, Lewis and Lizzie Williams.
Daniel Williams (1782-1874), second son of Jacob, had his home at Caratunk, where he married Abigail Maynard. They had three sons : Prescott, who raised a family at Caratunk; Nel- son and John. Daniel's second wife was Eliza J. (Lane) Whit- ney, widow of Silas Whitney. Mrs. Archie Clark of Caratunk is one of Prescott's grandchildren.
John Williams (1784-1867) next of the ten brothers was twice married - first to Sally Maynard (1786) of Caratunk and sec- ond to Belinda, daughter of Robert Wells of Embden. Like his brother Caleb, John held fast to his Embden heritage. He cleared a farm near the Edward Savage mills. It became known as the Williams homestead on the road from the Thaddeus Boothby farm to Solon ferry. It has now been abandoned and is growing up to forest. Daniel K. Williams (1840-1918), a son by John's second marriage, was long the owner there. His wife was Margaret Berry, daughter of Michael F., over near the Concord line.
Daniel K. had a proud record of service in his locality. His sons have done well. Charles, a graduate of Anson Academy, resides at Longmont, Colo. His wife is Lenora Thompson, of Embden, an Academy classmate. Prof. Guy F. Williams, a younger son of Daniel, has been identified with educational work in New England. He was graduated at Anson Academy in 1903, at Bates College in 1908 as a Phi Beta Kappa man and took an A. M. degree at Yale in 1910. His teaching record has been a brilliant one, including three years as principal of Som- erset Academy, following which he was principal of Anson Acad- emy for eleven years. His work as an instructor has been in
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Biology, Mathematics, Eng- lish, History and Civics and includes three years service as an instructor in Smith- Hughes Agricultural lines. He holds a life-teaching cer- tificate from the Maine Edu- cational Bureau. Because of his interests as a member of the County Farm Bureau and President of the County Sun- day School Association he was in demand as a public speak- er. He also frequently occu- pied the pulpits of churches at North Anson and adjoin .. ing towns. In recent years Prof. Williams has been en- PROFESSOR GUY F. WILLIAMS gaged in educational work at Ashland, N. H. Chester K. Wil- liams, deceased, a progressive Embden farmer on a large scale and Palmer A. Williams of North Anson were his brothers.
The John Williams family tree by his first marriage had sturdy Embden branches. One was a son, John Howard Wil- liams (1810-1852), who married Roxanna Felker. She was a woman of charming personality, whom local people remember in the house of the late Francis Burns, her son-in-law, over in the Berry neighborhood, where her daughter, Mary Ann resided, Abigail Mariam Williams (1809-1856) was the second wife of Capt. Nathaniel B. Moulton, probably the most militant figure of northwest Embden and Concord in the good old militia days. A second daughter, Joanna Dean (1811-1890), was Mrs. Dennis Taylor with eleven children.
Richard Williams (1787), Jacob's fourth son, built a house about 35 years after his father erected the pioneer cabin. It was sheathed with boards sawed at a mill newly erected several miles away. The three foot shingles were split by hand and trimmed with drawknives. This was in Concord. Calvin Wil- liams, one of Richard's children, was born there May 25, 1829.
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When he became a young man Calvin Williams went to Massa- chusetts for a few years and upon his return married Susan C. Wells (1829), daughter of Ralph of Embden. When the eldest of their eight children was to be born it was deemed advisable for Mrs. Williams to go to her mother's home in Embden for the event.
Her son of April 21, 1852, was Dr. James Leon Williams of New York, owner of "Concord Haven," splendid as a castle on the Rhine. Among his boyhood duties was that of watching his father's cattle graze in the autumn. Sometimes it was so cold he climbed on the fence to save his bare feet from frost bite, as many another lad of that day and generation had done. The Concord school facilities were not as good as down at No. 3 dis- trict in Embden, so he attended winter terms there. It whetted his desire for a larger education.
Thus Dr. Williams, native of Embden, laid the foundations there and in Concord for his distinguished career. A dentist by profession, with fame on both sides the Atlantic for research and authorship, his intellectual interests and activities have ex- tended to various fields. His progress from the Concord farm began at 16 with two years of high school and attendance at Oak Grove Seminary. He won a money prize for the best original poem by a native American under 21 years of age. He began practicing dentistry but as soon as he had accumulated $100 in- vested it in a microscope.
That was Dr. Williams' beginning for a long series of important investigations, which influenced dental practice pro- foundly. He embodied the results of his studies in several books, the publication of which attracted wide attention. Baltimore College gave him the degree of Doctor of Dental Surgery and the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland bestowed upon him the degree of L. D. S. He was invited to lecture before the Royal Society of Great Britain. His writings have been copied into many text books. The leading dental societies of the world have voted him honorary membership.
Dr. Williams' reputation as a writer is not confined to pro- fessional topics. While sojourning in England some years ago he wrote a book on "Home and Haunts of Shakespeare." He is
DR. JAMES LEON WILLIAMS
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also an artist and an oil painter and drew the illustrations for his book, "Sicily, Land of Departed Gods and Old Romance." He is an annual visitor to "Concord Haven" where he spends the summer months.
A recently published volume covers in detail Dr. Williams' remarkable life story, with an introduction by C. N. Johnson, president of the American Dental Association. The biographer, Dr. George Wood Clapp, includes examples of Dr. Williams' philosophical and ethical writings. There are also vivid pages about conditions of life among the early townsmen of Embden and Concord and paintings by Mrs. Williams of their house and near-by scenes.
The farm at Concord on which he passed his boyhood days was purchased by Dr. Williams in 1915. On the high land by the Kennebec with an entrancing prospect he erected his palatial residence. The river view there is superb and includes the charming landscape of three towns near the Caratunk Falls.
Next after Richard of Pioneer Jacob's ten sons was Isaac Wil- liams (1789-1860). He married Rachael Heald of Bingham, in 1815 and was a resident of Embden till after 1830. Next was Ebenezer (1793-1870), who in 1816 made Mahala Richards of Norridgewock his wife, but departed from the town earlier than Isaac.
Cyrus Williams (1796-1864) was one of a half dozen Embden men who ventured notably in hotel enterprises. He lived at home for a time. Soon after his marriage to Fidelia Perkins of North Anson in 1823, he moved to the village and kept tavern there in a house on the northeast corner of the present grounds of the Mark Emery school. Cyrus sold this house to Lawyer David Bronson and purchased the Somerset Hotel of Daniel Steward, conducting it from 1830 to 1831. In front of the hotel at that time - nearly 100 years ago - was a sign post, or- namented with a picture of Washington on horseback.
When Henry Stone acquired the Somerset Hotel of him, Cyrus Williams went away to Waterville and kept hotel there for a long period. Waterville was then the terminus for two railroads - the Penobscot and Kennebec and the Androscoggin and Ken- nebec. Cyrus had two daughters, both of whom died young and
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were buried on Graveyard Hill at North Anson - his only chil- dren.
Francis Williams (1798-1869) lived in Embden some years after his marriage to Nancy Hayward, a native of Easton, Mass., and between 1819 and 1838, had an old fashioned Williams fam- ily of 11 children. Atwell R., Harriet H., Clarissa H., Charles W., Horace S., Jason P., were born in Embden but about 1830 Francis moved to Caratunk, where four more sons and one more daughter came to them. Their oldest son, Atwell, had a family of 12, of whom Lewis Williams died recently at Caratunk. The four surviving children, Albert, Ruel, and Oliver Williams and Mrs. B. F. Wiley now reside at Caratunk.
Jacob Williams, Jr. (1802-1854), made an interesting mar- riage in 1822 with Parmelia Savage, daughter of Dr. Edward about the time the preacher changed his residence from West Embden to the Jacob Williams neighborhood but moved away soon after 1825. Benjamin R. Williams, residing at Brewer, Me., was a son of Jacob and Parmelia. Mrs. Addie P. Shattuck of Skowhegan was their daughter. A letter written by him in 1921 to an Embden cousin has been preserved from which the following about the Williams and Savage families is quoted :
"The Williamses of New England came from Wales, Eng., immigrants of long ago. My grandmother Joanna Dean Williams was of pure Scotch lineage. My uncles, Richard and Isaac, and my Aunt Elsa, who married Benjamin Atwood, showed this Scotch blood more plainly than any of the others. So I learned long ago.
"The original Savage family came from Normandy, France, to England with William the Conqueror. Some of them - the men - were priests and soldiers and were in favor with William and the Pope. Some of them went to Ireland with Earl of Pembroke, alias Strongbow, and took part in the conquest of Ireland. They were quite prominent there until Cromwell's time but were on the wrong side and were down until the Restoration. Then they flourished for a while and some of them were with William of Orange when he went after King James. Those that came to America about 1630 were of the Protestant faith. Some of them settled near Boston. Our ancestors came from Woolwich, Maine.
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Another lot went to Virginia and settled near Richmond. Savage Station on the York and Richmond Railroad, was the ancestral home. President Tyler's first wife was one of the Virginia branch.
"A Grand Uncle of my grandfather, Edward Savage, was a bachelor and got rich in silk and linen trade in Ireland. He had one brother who came to America. He was the grandfather of my grandfather Savage, who lies buried in the churchyard at Solon Village."
Chandler Williams (1804-1888), youngest son of Jacob and Joanna's 15, married Rebecca Hunnewell. He was living at Embden in 1841 but later had his household at Moscow, which used to be called Sugar Town. He had a son Nason, born in 1834. Chandler moved to Jackson, Calif., in 1855 and in 1871 Nason married Rosallie Worley there.
Relatively few names of the grandchildren of Jacob Williams have been given here. The list even into 1860 is too long for this history. They and their distant kinsmen from Lieut. Lemuel were a staunch and creditable percentage of the town's population. Timothy Williams, on Lot 104 in the Soule pur- chase in 1827, was from Woolwich and of the same family, prob- ably an adopted son. Like other big Embden clans of the earlier years the recent generations have sought their fortunes else- where. Williams is now an exceptional name in the town, where sons and daughters of Jacob and Lemuel builded long and nobly.
CHAPTER IX
GOOD CHEER AT THE INN
Residence citadel of olden days, sedate upon its hilltop and hard by the river's swarthy current. Center of early industry, with blacksmith shop, tannery and schoolhouse clustered on a site that might have become Embden village. Hospitable tavern with roaring backlog and tap room to cheer passers-by in a procession of generations. Rooftree to a robust group of kin. Place where dwelt in patriarchal authority the master mind of a large community till the Kennebec's icy waters at the ferry one November got him in untimely grasp and bore him to eternity.
This was the old square house - just west of the present day iron bridge to Solon, built in 1909. Now otherwise painted, it was nevertheless known as Embden's yellow mansion for a hundred years and more and the seat of Pioneer Moses Thompson.
"Uncle Mose" (1768-1831) of Scotch-Irish ancestry with surpassing lands and herds was an influential townsman. His wife was Mary Churchill (1768-1847), daughter of Capt. Joseph Churchill (1744-1828) and of an outstanding family in Embden, Caratunk and New Portland. His sons-in-law and daughters- in-law were from the hearthstones of Hiltons, Hutchinses, Grays, Michaels, Crymbles, Getchells, Stevenses and Durrells - pros- perous farmers from an extensive countryside.
For a decade Moses Thompson kept $600 at interest. That was a tidy sum for an Embden farmer in the 1820's, when the town had an even hundred resident landholders. Likely enough it represented part of his profits from droves of fat cattle that he took summers and autumns up the Kennebec and along the Chaudiere to English buyers in Quebec. But his son, Reuben who married Rebecca Hilton of Wiscasset and took charge of his father's tannery and leather business, after John Bachelder relinquished that place had $150 more. This, probably, was not altogether cash, but in some part the value of stock in trade.
THE OLD SOLON FERRY, LOOKING TOWARD EMBDEN, WITH MOSES THOMPSON BARN IN THE DISTANCE. THE YELLOW MANSION. THE NEW BRIDGE AT SAME POINT, LOOKING TOWARD SOLON.
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There were only three or four others in Embden then, whose possession of money the assessors deigned to notice. Joshua Gray, a mile or so down the road, had a maximum of $300 "on hand;" Cyrus Boothby had $50 at interest; Andrew McFadden, $50; his brother Thomas - possibly it was his father of the same name - $80.
When Yankee farmers of that period fell to bragging, their ownership of cows was a favorite medium of conversation, even as in Patriarch Abraham's day it was the count of cattle on the hills. Moses bulked large in ownership of cows. Hence the oft' told tale at Moses' store of the loafer, name now unknown but familiar then to travellers up and down the valley. "Me and Mose," he used to say, "owns more cows than any other two men in town," climaxed with the explanation that Mose owned ten while he owned one.
This was quite as veracious as many another taproom tale. It was probably first told along in 1821, when the tax lists show that Moses Thompson's dairy establishment was largest, but it could not have gone unchallenged along the Kennebec - would have hardly been told at all to wayfarers from Seven Mile Brook.
Moses Thompson's yellow mansion, which at first had been assessed at $700, was put down in 1821 at a valuation of $500. He had two barns, worth, for taxing purposes, $120; nine oxen, nine cows, four horses, and some twenty head of young stock. Embden town records for 1820 show there were in town 43 horses, 56 yokes of oxen, 50 houses, 66 barns and 179 cows. Headliners in the cow census that year were: Asahel Hutchins with ten; Simeon Cragin and James Pain with seven each (all farmers by Seven Mile Brook) ; John Gray and Caleb Williams, with six each; and Benjamin Colby, Jr., Thomas McFadden, Andrew McFadden and Joshua Gray with five each. The six settlers last named all resided near the Kennebec and were near neighbors of Moses.
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