USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Boothbay Harbor > History of Boothbay, Southport and Boothbay Harbor, Maine. 1623-1905. With family genealogies > Part 11
USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Southport > History of Boothbay, Southport and Boothbay Harbor, Maine. 1623-1905. With family genealogies > Part 11
USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Boothbay > History of Boothbay, Southport and Boothbay Harbor, Maine. 1623-1905. With family genealogies > Part 11
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The settlement, so far as individual instances of location are concerned, will be taken up in another chapter ; in a gen- eral way it may be said that indications point to Boothbay Harbor, from a point a short distance easterly from Mill Cove, across to Pisgah, and again easterly from Pisgah, at the head of Lobster Cove, on both sides of the Echo Lake Brook, as being the selected places by the Dunbar colonists.
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
There exist among the Lincoln County records, and also in the State House at Boston, several depositions, taken in 1770 or soon after, and filed for future reference by settlers at this period. Probably the principal objeet for this extraordinary act was that, in view of the harassing of land claimants living elsewhere, keeping the inhabitants in an unsettled and insecure state of mind, and the consideration that the settlers of 1730 and 1731 were advanced in years and few in number, it was done in a protective sense for the good of their descendants. No more opportune place to introduce these depositions appears than the present, for they embody, practically, the greater part which is obtainable relating to the history of this colony until about the time it assumes town organization.
DEPOSITION OF WILLIAM MOORE. July 6, 1770.
William Moore of more than seventy years testifieth and saith sometime in the fall of the year 1730 he with several others were settled in a place called Townsend by Col. Dunbar their agent of the Crown at Pemaquid. That David Bryant was one of his neighbors then settled by the said Dunbar on the same footing with the other settlers, which were as follows : that forty feet upon the shore was to be common to all fisher- men unless the settlers adjoining should consent to make fish for any fisherman at two shillings and sixpence per quintal, in which case said forty feet were to be included in his lot ; that the lotts on the shore were to contain two aeres ; that the set- tlers were to build an house eighteen feet in length upon them and settle there; that upon that condition each was to have forty acres backward from thence added to the lotts of this settlement, and further backward still one hundred acres more ; that the said David Bryant was then settled on the lot now in possession of Rev. John Murray in Boothbay, then Townsend ; that he built an house according to the above articles upon it ; that some years afterward he had the said lott run out by one Willis a surveyor at his expense so as to contain fifty acres and inhabited and improved the same for some years until he sold his Right to Edmund Brown another of Said settlers under the Said Dunbar, from which time the Said Dunbar relin- quished the possession and the Said Brown entered upon it and continued to occupy the premises in company with this deponent mowed the meadow belonging to said lott, which
.
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THE DUNBAR SETTLEMENT.
formerly had been mowed by the Said Bryant. Said Meadow and all others in the Neck up to the rocks in the Damariscotty River having been granted to said settlers in common by the Said Dunbar, and by the Said settlers divided into lotts for their convenience ; that Said Brown continued in possession of Said premises until August 1739 when he gave the inhabit- ants a deed of it in trust for the first settled minister there ; that the same inhabitants entered upon and kept possession thereof until the settlement of the Rev. John Murray in the ministry among them; the first minister of Said Townsend; when it was given up to him, in whose hands it remains until now & further saith not.
William Moore.
DEPOSITION OF SAMUEL McCOBB. October 23, 1772.
Samuel McCobb, aged 64 years, testifieth and saith, that in the year 1729, Col. Dunbar came with a commission from his most excellent Majesty George the Second, with instruc- tions to take possession and settle with the inhabitants, in behalf of the Crown, the lands lying to the Eastward of the Kennebec River in said Province, that with a number of men and necessaries he arrived at Pemaquid in the same year, and forthwith proceeded to survey and settle several towns around, publicly inviting His Majesty's liege subjects to come and set- tle thereon, promising them ample encouragement in the name of the King, his master. In consequence of which encourage- ment the Deponent with more than 40 others, applied to the said Dunbar and by him were brought to and settled on a cer- tain neck of land bounded on the sea, and lying between the Sheepscot and Damariscotta Rivers, the which lands the said Dunbar had laid out in parallel lotts, twelve rods broad, con- taining two acres apiece, and ordered the settlers to cast lots for their respective places, which being done, the said Dunbar did, in the King's name and behalf, put them in possession of lotts they had respectively drawn, and promised that on condi- tion of their building one house eighteen feet long and clearing two acres within the space of three years he could give them an addition of forty acres in one, and one hundred in another division, as contiguous to the first two acres as possible, in fee simple forever, and likewise to add thereto another division devising to each settler any number of acres besides, less than 1,000, which they should request. A number having complied with these terms, and said Dunbar offered to give them deeds
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
of said lands, but the Execution thereof was delayed, and in the year 1733 he was removed to New Hampshire. The lands being naturally broken and poor, and more especially then, in their wild uncultivated state, and the settlers coming there generally in low circumstances, and most of them (as being from Britain and Ireland) utterly unacquainted with the mode of managing lands in that state, little of the necessaries of life was raised from the soil, their whole living depended on cutting firewood and carrying it to Boston and other towns more than one hundred and fifty miles from them; hence the settlers lived, from the first, exposed to the utmost Extremities of Indigence and Distress, and at the same time in almost contin- ual alarms from the Savages all around, till the year 1745, when the murders and depredations in their borders forced them from their Habitations to seek shelter in the westward, where they were scattered in a strange country, at nearly 200 miles distance from their homes, for five years. In October, 1749, as soon as the news of Peace reached them, this depo- nent with many of his former neighbors ventured back to their Said Settlements where they had scarce finished the repairs of their wasted cottages and improvements, when in a year or thereabouts, the Indians tho' in a time of Peace fell on their neighborhood, burnt barns, killed many cattle, attacked the little garrison kept by the people, and carried away a number of men, women and children into Captivity. By this the deponent and his neighbors were Obliged to flee to the little fortress they had raised for themselves where they lived and defended themselves as they might, not daring to look after their plantations, by which means the little provisions then growing for their support the next winter were chiefly destroyed whereby, when they returned to their places, little better than the Horrors of famine were in prospect ; many were obliged to live by clams only, which they dug out of the mud when the tides were down; thus they subsisted in general till the late war with France broke out, when tho' their cries were sent up to the Government for some Protection on this settlement, which they still held in the King's behalf, and from which should they again be driven they knew not where to seek a place of abode, yet no defence or assistance went to or a morsel of bread was allowed them, but such as they found for themselves, by garrisons and guards of their own where their families lived in continual Terror and Alarm from the Savages who ranged the Wilderness all around, till the late Peace was concluded, when their Settlement was increased much by new comers from the Western Parts. Thus happily rid of the French and Indians they were not long suffered to rest for
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THE DUNBAR SETTLEMENT.
three or four opposite setts of claimers, part claiming by Indian deeds Never approved according to Law, and part by pretended ancient occupation and other Pretexts never justified in Law, at divers times came among them demanding the pos- session of these said lands, or requiring a purchase of them. These imposing upon the Credulous Simplicity of some of the Inhabitants by fair promises, and terrifying others with Threats of Lawsuits for which the poor Settlers were ill provided, so far prevailed that the generality were fain to contract with and buy their lands from one or another of them, and some of them all successively, and such as have not done so are still harassed by the said Claimers and threatened by each in his turn, with Law Suits, Ejectments, if not Imprisonments and Ruin, whilst those of whom they bought have never done anything to defend them from competing claimers, and all have left them to become a prey to who comes next. However, by the help of God, they continued on their said possession till the year 1764, when desirous of obtaining the Benefit of order and the enjoyment of the Gospel, they applied to the General Court of the Province and were legally incorporated into a town by the name of Boothbay and tho' the generality of them are in very low circumstances, many in extreme Indigence, and very few able to raise on their farms provisions to supply their families for nine months in the year, yet in the year 1765, without any help from the Publick (from abroad), they at their own cost and charge erected a church, settled a Gospel minister and still endeavor to support the Gospel amongst them, and likewise to contribute their required part towards defraying the charges of government, and in all other respects to demean themselves as peaceful and loyal subjects of King George the Third.
These things the deponent testifyeth to facts within his own proper knowledge to be personally present, and intimately interested therein and he declareth that the deposition is not given with any injurious intent towards any person whatsoever. Samuel McCobb.
DEPOSITION OF JOHN BEATH. October 23, 1772.
John Beath aged sixty-two years testifieth that he lived with his Father who dwelt at Lunenburg, in the Western part of Said Province, when the news was published over New England that his most excellent majesty King George the sec- ond had commissioned and sent to Pemaquid, in the Eastern Part of Said Province, a certain Col. Dunbar, as his agent to
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
take possession and begin the settlement of the lands to the Eastward of the Kennebec River in his majesty's name and behalf, and said Col. Dunbar was arrived, and had published large encouragement to any of his majesty's Protestant liege subjects who should settle on Said lands. In pursuance of which the deponent together with his Father and family, in June A. D. 1731 left their Plantation, and at no small expense transported themselves, their stock and effects to Pemaquid, when after treating with the said Dunbar, this deponent with his father, and as he supposes above sixty others, were, by the said Dunbar, settled on a neck of Land bounded by the sea lying between the Sheepscott & Damariscotty Rivers, then called the Winnegance contiguous to a fine Harbor, where Dunbar said he proposed to fonnd a City, and which place he then called Townsend. Said Dunbar employed one Mitchell said to be the King's surveyor to lay out our Said lands in parcels twelve rods wide, containing two acres each of which were determined to the several Settlers by Lott.
Then the said Dunbar contracted with the said Deponent and others to give them forty acres in one division and one hundred in another, as near as might be to the two acres on which they severally settled and that on condition of each set- tler's building an house eighteen feet long and clearing two acres of land the Said Dunbar engaged to give each a deed under the King's Seal of said one hundred and forty-two acres, as also, to any Settlers that required it any number of acres next adjoining his own less than one thousand. That this deponent with many other of the Settlers fulfilled the Said con- ditions, and in consequence thereof Said Dunbar offered them deeds, but as they had to be sent to a gentleman at a distance to be sealed, he advised them to defer it until he should have the seal committed to his own hands, which he expected very soon would be the case and thus the matter stood until Said Dunbar was removed. Yet that, being placed on the Said Lands in the King's Name and Behalf, the Settlers resolved to keep their possessions till his majesty should see fit by the same authority to remove them, the which they have hitherto done under hardships scarcely tolerable to human nature, partly from want of Sustenance, being nearly 200 miles from the place where all their provisions must be procured whence in the Winter of several years the inhabitants must inevitably perished by famine had they not been supplied from the clam bank with their only food for several months together, and partly by the enemy that continually harassed them and for the most part pent them up close in their little garrisons and once forced them from their settlement for several years, no
.44
L
Boothbay Harbor from the foot of Pisgah.
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THE DUNBAR SETTLEMENT.
support or defence being afforded them by the Government, but on the contrary a number of their men were carried off to defend places elsewhere. That on the 19th of August 1749 this deponent and 17 others was taken captive with the Indians, but they were detained till November, that the Said Indians took from him a sloop of sixty tons burthen, with her cargo, and tho' this deponent had bargained with them for the Ransom thereof, she was sold to the French at St. Peters, whereby he was returned to his family after many hardships having now lost his all, and having yet a large share of the vessel to pay for, by which means his young and numerous family who depended on his labors for subsistence were reduced to many and great extremities. John Beath.
DEPOSITION OF WILLIAM FULLERTON. October 23, 1772.
William Fullerton aged 67 years testifieth & saith that he was one of the first settlers on the lands in Townsend now Boothbay, where he still dwells. That he hath examined a deposition by Samuel McCobb of the same date and caption with this relating to the settlement of Said lands and he declares the facts therein related to be true and further adds that the chief garrison made by the Said settlement against the enemy was a Small Stone House which they jointly fortified with a Flanker and Watch Box rearward & a Picquet hold in front and in which they kept a constant guard during all the War. That instead of getting any support from the Government a number of men belonging to said Settlement were carried off into the war and several of them lost their lives in it. And from the first to the present day the Inhabitants of this Settle- ment have studied to approve themselves to be loyal subjects and friends to Government have never cut down, to the depo- nents knowledge, or destroyed any tree fit for any service as a mast in his majesty's navy, nor ever joined in any of the late unhappy disputes between this Government and the Mother Country. William Fullerton.
DEPOSITION OF WILLIAM MOORE. October 23, 1772.
William Moore aged 74 years testifieth and saith that he hath perused the above deposition of Samuel McCobb of the same date and - with this, concerning the Settlement of
9
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
Boothbay in said County, and that he was intimately acquainted with all the facts therein stated, as having been one of the first settlers and on the premises at the time referred to, and from his own knowledge he declares the above relation to be true, and further adds that the names of the Several Towns begun by the Said Col. Dunbar were Frederick's Fort, Harrington, Walpole, New Castle and Townsend. The four last were to meet at a noted Ledge of Rocks in the Damariscotty River. That on Townsend the said Col. Dunbar said he meant to found a city, that the two acre lotts were laid out by his order by one Mitchell the King's Surveyor sent from Annapolis in Nova Scotia, for that purpose and after him by one Newman sent by said Dunbar from Pemaquid. That the reason why this deponent and the other Settlers who had fulfilled the con- ditions required did not receive deeds from Dunbar, was by him discovered to be because they must needs be sent to a certain Governor Armstrong in Said Annapolis to be scaled, which being a hardship on Settlers and disagreeable to Said Dunbar, he advised them to defer the execution of the deeds, till he should have an answer from the Court of Great Britain to an application he had made requesting the Seal should be committed to himself. That the Poverty of the Inhabitants joined to their distance to any market, to the brokeness of the soil, to their continual alarms from the enemy rendered pro- visions so scarce among them that the only subsistance the deponent could find for himself and his family was clams and water for weeks together and he knows not of any of the Set- tlers that were not then in the same state. That when the first child was born in the Settlement not more than three quarts of Meal could be found among them all. That in the time of the late French war the said settlers petitioned the General Court for some assistance or defence, that said petition was sent to Boston by Robert Wylie late of Boothbay deceased, that this deponent treated with several members of the General Court about it but no relief was ever offered the Government, & fur- ther saith not.
William Moore.
Whatever may be said or thought of Dunbar's course of procedure, which certainly was arbitrary and irregular, it still must be said of him that he was a man of energy and action, and while in power matters went along successfully. His chief characteristic seems to have been to let the future take care of itself if only his present purposes might be accomplished. It has been suggested that perhaps his arbitrary methods were
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THE DUNBAR SETTLEMENT.
due to his instructions, but these he refused to show. By him all former claims were disregarded. Royal grants, proprietors' claims and Indian deeds all fared alike. This was in accord- ance with the theory that the title was in the Crown ; but, for whatever reason, it bred strong opposition on every side.
The tables of the General Court in Boston were crowded by petitions for Dunbar's removal, though it was powerless to act except by appeal to the Crown; but this was done by a committee of investigation, appointed for the purpose, which denounced his action. Samuel Waldo, agent for the claimants under the Muscongus patent, went to England for this purpose only. Shem Drowne, proprietor of the Drowne claim, peti- tioned the Crown; and Governor Belcher, of Massachusetts, used every influence possible in the same direction. In England the matter was referred to the Attorney and Solicitor General. Both sides were represented by counsel. The law officers of the Crown allowed the matter to hinge on the ques- tion whether England had, by the new charter to Massachusetts in 1692, in which jurisdiction over both Sagadahoc and Nova Scotia 1 had been given that Government, lost this jurisdiction in the conquest by France in 1696, or in the retaking, in 1710, by England, and the retrocession by France, revived it. It was decided that these changes had no effect to annul the rights of Massachusetts, that they only suspended her rights.
The report was made in August, 1731, and adopted by the Government, but his dismissal did not occur until August 10, 1732. The same order that dismissed Dunbar withdrew the soldiers from Pemaquid and revoked whatever authority Gov- ernor Phillips, of Nova Scotia, had received over Sagadahoc territory. Dunbar remained as long as excuses would permit him to do so at Pemaquid, when he removed to New Hamp- shire, of which Province he was Lieutenant Governor. He still held his commission of Surveyor General. Becoming very unpopular in New Hampshire, he returned to property he still held at Belvidera Point, situated across the pond from Dama- riscotta Mills, in a westerly direction from the County Fair Grounds. There he built a fine house and lived until 1737,
1. Massachusetts had voluntarily relinquished Nova Scotia to the Crown, though having received in its charter jurisdiction over it, but had never relinquished Saga- dahoc or any territory west of the St. Croix.
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
when he went to England. Reaching there old creditors caused his arrest and he was thrown into prison, but was soon released through the influence of friends. In England he still held the Surveyor's commission, but in consideration of £2,000 sterling was persuaded to resign, when, in 1743, he was appointed Governor of the Island of St. Helena, destined later to become world-famous as the exile home of the great Napoleon. Where or when he died is not known. He probably never revisited America ; but after his death his widow came to Maine and married a man by name of Henderson, living in Cushing as late as 1776. The larger part of the families who came into the towns settled by Dunbar located in Townsend. But few settled in Newcastle. The names to be found in Bristol rec- ords, coming there under him, are Young, Kent, Sproul, Reed, Burns, Bailey and Henderson, previously mentioned, who married Colonel Dunbar's widow and removed to Cushing.
CHAPTER IX. 1733 TO 1764.
F OUR of the six Indian wars which devastated the coast of Maine have been previously mentioned. The last of these had closed in 1725, four years before the advent of Dunbar at Pemaquid. The settlements, therefore, enjoyed a respite from general warfare, offensive and defensive, for a longer period at about this time than for many years before. No general alarm, all along the line, occurred again until 1745. There happened, during this so-called period of peace, many minor depredations, carried on in a predatory manner, and the Townsend settlers have stated that to some extent they suffered in this way, but they have not left us the story of the specific instances of injury.
For some months before the outbreak which occurred on July 19, 1745, a hostile attitude had been discerned on the part of the natives by the colonists. Their attitude just before a war had been studied so that now it was recognized as a cer- tain precursor. This was known as the Spanish or Five Years' War and lasted until the treaty at Falmouth, October 16, 1749. Nearly all the native tribes west of the Penobscot River had been reduced to mere remnants and these had gone to Canada, where they became merged with those of the St. Francois or other tribes. But they inherited the traditions of their ances- tors, a leading feature of which was an eternal hatred of the English settlers. They now returned to the coast of Maine, reinforced by the tribes from Cape Sable and St. John. Many of the younger warriors had been born since a general war had been on between the two races and were eager for the conflict. The method in this, as in previous wars, evidently aimed at extermination of what they termed intruders on the grounds which they considered naturally theirs.
The first blows were struck, almost simultaneously, at St. George, Newcastle and Pemaquid. There was not a great loss
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HISTORY OF BOOTHBAY.
of life in this war, which has been accounted for by the fact that the whites better understood the methods of Indian war- fare than formerly. There were, however, some casualties in nearly every town along the coast. Several were killed at Sheepscot, Newcastle, St. George, Wiscasset, New Meadows, North Yarmouth and other places farther west. The colonists at Townsend, realizing their weakness both from point of num- bers and lack of fortifications, sought safety in Massachusetts, where many of them had first arrived on coming to America. There they stayed from the outbreak to the close of the war, and again was this peninsula barren of population ; but this time it was fonr instead of forty years. Early in 1749 several families came back to their homes, and from the deposition of John Beath we learn that he and seventeen others were cap- tured and carried away into captivity, being held from Angust 19th until the following November. But Samuel McCobb tells us that he and others did not return until after peace was declared in October.
Beginning anew, in 1749, the Townsend settlers had a respite from Indian hostilities until April, 1755. Then the French and Indian War came upon the entire country, involv- ing every part of the English and French possessions in America. It was destined to eclipse all former wars as to magnitude and far-reaching effects. At the commencement both a New England and a New France existed- at its close New England stood alone ; New France had gone down, never again to gain an ascendancy. Those times present great food for reflection. Just then England and the colonists were driving France from the Atlantic shores of the New World; a generation later France, with no expectation of territorial gain, was assisting the colonists to drive England from the more promising part of the same seaboard. Thus by this European dnel, on American shores, were both forms of royalty and foreign influence relegated back to their proper limits and the better part of America was left as a free home for those who had here cast their lots.
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