History of Penobscot County, Maine; with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 220

Author: Williams, Chase & Co., Cleveland (Ohio)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Cleveland, Williams, Chase & Co.
Number of Pages: 1100

USA > Maine > Penobscot County > History of Penobscot County, Maine; with illustrations and biographical sketches > Part 220

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In the southeast angle of the town is the Ware Pond,

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

a narrow sheet about a mile long, closely parallel with another of equal width, but somewhat east of it, the two forming the headwaters of the Passadumkeag Stream, no other part of which flows in this town. Two little bays at the united head of these lakes receives a tributary, the easternmost an affluent in two branches, coming in from Springfield, and uniting a little way inside the Lee line ; the other rises in a pretty large pond a mile to the north- west, and receives a tiny affluent about half-way to Ware Pond. The former pond has itself a very small affluent in two branches from the north. A petty lake a mile below Lee village sends a tributary thither to the outlet of Mattakeunk Pond, on its way receiving a mile-long tributary from another and very small pond east of its own source.

Two smallish ponds in the north part of Township No. 3 send their upper edges just inside the south boundary of Lee. Between them flows into No. 3 a small stream rising very near the little pond south of the post-office. Another, flowing about a mile in Lee, passes into No. 3 about midway between the head of the Passa- dumkeag and the nearest lake on the town line. Within a mile northeast of Lee village the Mattakeunk has two petty tributaries from the northwest, and one from the south. A mile and a half further, and quite near each other, two more come in from the east. Half a mile from the north line of the town a larger stream from the westward, with an affluent passing near School No. 8, enters the Mattakeunk. West of the heads of this tributary are the sources of another stream which flows about two miles north into Winn, which it crosses to a junction with the Penobscot.

The stage road from Lincoln post-office through Lee into Springfield is the most thickly settled up of any part of the town, except the road from Lee post-office south- east and south of Mattakeunk Pond, which is very densely settled east and west from School No. 5. This road makes an angle at the town line, about two-thirds of a mile from the southwest corner, and runs northwest and north to a junction with the stage road. Southeast of the pond, a mile from the village, a road branches off southeast and east, past School No. 8, to a north and south road running from near the south line of the town to the stage road a mile east of Lee post-office, and across it about a mile and a quarter further to the Town Farm, one-third of a mile north of School No. 2. Nearly one-half mile west of this school a road runs south of east into Springfield, putting forth a mile away a branch toward Ware Pond, which also presently runs into Springfield. The stage road is again crossed, two miles northwest of Lee village, by a north and south road starting near the northwest corner of the town, meeting, a mile below, the road from East Winn village, near School No. 7, and thence running across the stage road to the neighborhood of Mattakeunk Pond, where it turns south- west, and ends near the town line a mile west of the pond. A north and south road also connects East Winn with Lee post-office. It is connected with the stage road by a two-mile highway on the west, making a right-angle . about half-way, and reaching the main road a mile north-

West of the village. On the other side of the Maitakeunk Stream a third road crosses the northeast angle of Lee for about one and one-fourth" miles. "From the stage road at the east town line another wagon-way starts northward, and keeps the town line about two and one- half miles to a junction with the East Winn road. On this line road, a mile above the stage route, a new post- office has been established of late years, and called North Lee.

At Lee village is the old post-office of the town, a Baptist and one other church, a public school-house, the building of the Lee Normal Academy, two cemeteries, a trotting park around the little Beaver Pond, with the Beaver Pond Stream flowing partly across it into the Pond, and a considerable number of mills, stores, and shops. It is a flourishing and very hopeful place.

HISTORICAL SKETCH .*

At the time of this writing, when the sad history of our second martyred President, James A. Garfield, has drawn the attention and sympathy of the civilized world, some slight attention has been called to Williams Col- lege, in Massachusetts, where he gave that study and re- ceived that disciplined mind fitting him for his heroic life work, so rudely cut short. In aid of that institution the State of Massachusetts granted (February 19, 1805) Township No. 4, Second Range north of Bingham's Purchase and east of the Penobscot River, afterwards Lee, the subject of this historical sketch. The deed was not recorded until February 15, 1820.

This grant was sold to different parties, - a majority to Nathaniel Ingersoll, of New Gloucester, Cumberland county, Maine, for which the college received, as appears by records in Massachusetts, the sum of $4,500.

The grant to the college was with the condition that thirty settlers were to be put on within three years, prob- ably extended, as Ingersoll did not complete by himself, or to those he sold to, the settling duties before 1828, or as appears by the college conveying the township to John Webber on May II, 1835. Webber lotted out the town in 1820, and seemed to have paid a debt of Ingersoll and other grantees to the college, or a trustee for them.

In 1822 Ingersoll began to perform these settling du- ties, and to that end he employed a man in Lowell co commence a clearing in Lee. This man, arriving at a point sloping Lee-ward and in good soil, thought he had reached the point intended and felled ten acres - the amount required. He then reported the same to Inger- soll, or agent, who was about to pay him, when, it being uncertain that the clearing was made in Lee, a man by the name of Harrison Strong was sent to investigate, who reported the land situated in Lincoln half-township.

In 1823 a clearing of ten acres was made on what is now the Harrison G. Rich place, in the southwest part of the town; and in 1824 Jeremiah Fifield and wife, of Howland; Thomas Lindsay, of Lowell; and Enoch Stone went to Lee and cleared up and planted the cut- ting made the year before.

Mrs. Lucy Fifield, wife of Jeremiah Fifield, afterwards

· By B. F. Fernald, Esq., of Winn.

HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

received one hundred acres of land as a reward for being the first woman to penetrate the wilderness of Lee. Their son Abram still resides in Lee, and Jeremiah lives in Winn, while a daughter married Joseph Deer and lives in Winn. March 13, 1825, Jeremiah Fifield, with his family, located on the ridge on a farm now occupied by Solomon and George Crocker. This ridge lies on a cross-road lying between the Winn and Lee and the Lee and Lincoln roads.

In March, 1826, John Tucker, of Dexter, Maine, came to Lee and located west of the Ames lot, now connected with the Nehemiah Kneeland place. In June, Samuel Parker, of Lowell, located on the Kneeland place; and about the same time Isaac Hobbs, of Howland, located on what is now the Ames lot.

In 1827 the first white child born in the town saw light - Mary Lucy, daughter of John Tucker. She is now the wife of John Varney, and resides in Lee.

A year previous to this, Thomas Lindsay, one of the 1824 pioneers, was married to Lucy, daughter of Jere- miah Fifield. This was the first marriage in Lee.

Judith, a daughter of Samuel Parker, was the first child to die in Lee; while the first death of an adult was that of a Mr. Robinson, of Sidney.

Mr. Fifield built a log-house, warm and home-like, as they often are, and here the first school in Lee was taught by his daughter Lucy. Among the first male teachers were John Towle, son of Joseph Towle, of Bangor; Benjamin Arnold, and John Jackson. The Tuckers, Parkers, and Stones still reside in Lee and vicinity.

At this early day there were two outlets to civilization, but when they were made could not be ascertained. The United States Government cut a road through the woods from below Lincoln mill. It ran through Lee and Springfield, direct to Houlton, and was used for the transportation of troops and rafters, and for getting sup- plies to the troops at Houlton. This road was followed by the county road, now known as the Lee and Lincoln road, and west of Lincoln as the Lee and Springfield road. In the deed it is called the St. Johns road.

Oaks and Cowan had been largely engaged in lumber- ing in Springfield, and on what is now Webster Planta- tion, east of Winn, and they had a winter road start from where Joseph Snow had located in Winn, in 1820, about a mile from the Lincoln line, and running back, very soon struck the town line between Winn and Lee. Fol- lowing this it very soon struck the line between Spring- field and Webster Plantation, and so on to the Mattagor- dus Stream, where Oaks and Cowan were lumbering in 1826-27. Mattagordus Stream emptied into the Matta- wamkeag less than a mile above the village of Kingman. This Oaks and Cowan road was used for a while by a mail carrier to Houlton. Starting from Snow's with the mail bag over his shoulder, he trudged along this road till he reached the Mattawamkeag, beyond Prentiss. From here he rowed to Haynesville, where he again took up his journey overland to Houlton. Over this road the immigrants came into Lee with their families in the snow. This route can be traced indistinctly now, though the new forest growth has about effaced the old emigrant road.

In the meantime, from the time Ingersoll had com- menced the clearing on the Rich place in 1823 he had been actively engaged in inducing settlers to locate in Lee, and had negotiated a large number of tracts from two hun- dred and fifty to one thousand acres in extent to different parties, but had not yet performed his settling duties suffi- cient to obtain a deed, and in fact did not until 1828. In 1825 the college sold to Samuel I. Mallett, of Litchfield, Kennebec county, Maine, fifteen hundred acres for which he paid the same price as Ingersoll, un condition he should settle upon it. Mallett looked over the situation and concluded to put in some mills on the west branch of the Mattakeunk Stream, which crosses the Lee and Springfield road at the village of Lee. This stream has its rise in the pond about a mile square, just back of the village, near where the first clearing in Lee was made. This sale was made June 5, 1827, Mallett giving a mort- gage to the college for the payment, which, however, he failed to pay, though he performed his settling duties as agreed. The same year Mallett and James D. Merrill, of Litchfield, who had purchased from Roger Merrill a claim for two hundred and fifty acres, joined their means and built a saw-mill in 1827 and a grist-mill in 1828, on the Mattakeunk Stream, a few rods west of the crossing of the Winn and Lincoln roads at the centre of the vil- lage. A saw- and grist-mill still stands on the stream at the village, not on the location of the first one, however.

During the years 1826-27-28, a large number of set- tlers came into town, especially in 1827, so that by the following year Ingersoll had with Mallett completed his settling duties, and obtained his deed of the township from the State of Massachusetts.

In 1826-27 came thirty settlers, of whom now are left only Godfrey Jackson, who came from Sidney, Kennebec county, and who was eighty-five years of age, June 22, 1881, a near neighbor of Alpheus Hale, who differs from him in age only a few months ..

Mallett's settlers were: Samuel Mallett,James D. Mer- rill, David Maxwell, Caleb Wilbor, Godfrey Jackson, Hiram Staples, and William Randall.

Ingersoll's settlers were: Bradley Blake, John Jackson, Enoch Stone, Thomas Lindsay, Jeremiah Fifield, Samuel Parker, John Tucker, Joel Barnard, Captain Benjamin Arnold, Alpheus Hale, Samuel Moulton, Joseph Hans- com, Joseph Smith, John Carpenter, Jabez Norton, Ben- jamin Whitten, and Moses Thule.

Among the other early settlers were: Alvah Tibbets, Joseph and Aaron Rollins, Winslow and Jeremiah Sta- ples, John Lunt, John Moss, Alvord Cushman, George Trask, David Henry, Peleg Jones, Albert Getchell, Wil- liam Doylers, Captain J. W. Hall, John Snyder, John Mallett, David Dyer, John B. Lidden, Benjamin Jackson, Alexander Potter, David Balley, Stephen Lee, Elisha Brown, and John Gott.

In 1829 Benjamin Whitten came from Litchfield, and located about a mile and a half from the village on the road to Lincoln, a near neighbor to Jackson and Hall. He was afterwards a contractor to get out the timber for the Mattawamkeag bridge, near a brook running into the Mattawamkeag, now called Whitten Brook. His widow,

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

now eighty-four years of age, is still living with her son Chester, in Lee, in the enjoyment of a happy old age. Chester, her son, is now Town Clerk and Director of Lee Normal Academy.

One of the most active business men of Lee was Arthur Prentiss, who came from Oxford to Paris, and was a trader in Lee, and blacksmith. He also built the Elm House building, and kept the first hotel in Lee. He was a cousin of the late Henry Prentiss, of Bangor, also the first trader in Lee, with his brother Addison.

Godfrey Jackson, above named, was one of those who were Mallett's settlers. He came from Sidney in 1827, and being a skillful carpenter, framed the Mallett mills. He made a location near the mills, what is now the Tuck place; he afterwards, through sickness in his family, had his attention called to medicine, and took up the study and soon completed a course at a medical college, from which he returned to Lee, and became the first settled physician. As an instance of the old man's former strength and vigor, it may be related that in his lifetime in Lee he caught twenty-two bears and one wolf.

Somewhere during the next decade, two important lawsuits occurred, which greatly interested the settlers in Lee, and lasted for twelve years in the State and United States Courts, Nathaniel Ingersoll, the purchaser of the College grant, conveyed his titles in Lee to Joseph E. Foxcroft, a resident of New Gloucester, who had been a member of the Massachusetts Legislature, and thought to have been a member of the Legislature which gave the Lee grant. When Maine became a State Mr. Foxcroft became a member of the Maine Legislature. He soon brought suit for the Mallett mortgage, which then re- mained unpaid; and obtained judgment before Judge Shepley for his claim against Mallett and against the settlers on Mallett's land.

Previous to these suits Ingersoll had by many expedi- ents endeavored to obtain from the settlers pay for his land sold them, or for the land on which they had made improvements, but they in many instances declared that they had paid enough. They felt harassed by Inger- soll and his agents, and in more than one instance gave evidence of those sentiments by acts hardly to be misunderstood, and yet not unmingled with the ludicrous.

On one occasion Ingersoll had gone to Lee with a deputy sheriff, Sanders, from Passadumkeag, and had taker. a lot of goods which one William Doble was haul- ing out to Lincoln for him, when crack went a rifle from the woods near by, and the officer's horse fell under him. The driver unhitched his team, and cleared for Lincoln over the hill top near by, with Ingersoll and the officer, leaving the goods and the vehicle in the woods. Soon after one William Randall, living in Lee, who was some- thing of a resident agent, went out to Lincoln to get some word from Ingersoll about his affairs in Lee, as he (Ingersoll) rather feared to come back to Lee, and Ran- dall, as he got along to the horse, was trying with the aid of his knife to get the shoes and nails off the dead horse. While intent on this, a bullet struck the frog of the horse's foot, and Randall incontinently fled, not even taking his knife, which he afterwards sought for in com-

pany with a friend. For years after that horse's feet were to be seen on the roadside fence near by as a reminder of the troublous times in Lee that tried men's souls and horses' feet.

On another occasion, while the tenantry were itching to give Mr. Ingersoll a personal castigation, the wife of John Tucker, a big, brawny, muscular woman, of whom there are innumerable anecdotes told, volunteered to perform a "birch withing," for which she was to receive a new gown or other article. So, hearing he was in town, she got her birches and placed them behind the door, and when he called she very cordially invited him in and then gave him an unmerciful withing. Ere the morning sun illumined their household she had her gown, but Ingersoll took her back to the Police Court at Bangor, where she was fined one cent and costs, which were paid by her neighbors in Lee, while she worked in a hotel to pay her way at Bangor and return.

As appears by a suit of Joseph E. Foxcroft vs. David E. Barnes, to recover the westerly half of Lot 12, Fifth Range in Lee, the Trustees of the college conveyed the township, May 11, 1835, to John Webber, and Nathaniel Ingersoll had conveyed all his interest in the township to John Webber on July 19, 1835, and John Webber, on June 19, 1835, conveyed one-half the lands which he had purchased of Nathaniel Ingersoll and of the Trustees of Williams College, to Joseph E. Foxcroft, of New Gloucester.

An abstract furnished by A. W. Paine, Esq., of Ban- gor, one of the counsel for the Mallett land and tenants, in the several lawsuits which involved nearly all the set- tlers' claims in town, may afford a clearer idea of the situation and the principles involved :

The township of Lee was originally granted by the Legislature of Massachusetts to Williams College, and by the College sold in individ- ual parcels to various individuals, as occasion offered, but mostly to parties in Cumberland county. The town was incorporated in 1832. Soon after its incorporation, in 1834, a series of lawsuits was com- menced, which lasted for about a dozen years. The litigation pertained mainly to the two lots No. 11, in the Fourth and Fifth Ranges, though several other lots were involved. They were the lots on which the mill privileges were located, and then owned and occupied by Samuel T. Mallett and his sons. The village was built mostly on these lots.

The point in dispute was in many respects simple, though calling out a great amount of legal learning, both on the part of counsel and courts. The original grant was made subject to the condition that the grantee should within three years place on the township thirty settlers. Mallett, having become interested in the town and settled there, had bought and paid for 1,500 acres, with the purpose of performing one- fourth the conditions of getting settlers, the acres known being in com- mon. He afterward took a deed of 6,000 acres, made in common, and mortgaged the same back to the College, describing the land as " The same this day conveyed to me and subject to the settlers' lots as land drawn on plan."

A proprietors' meeting was then held to make partition of the lands among the owners, at which meeting fifteen lots were assigned to set- tlers of the fifteen hundred acres, the Lots 11, in Fourth and Fifth Ranges, being a part, but the lots were not marked as such on the plan referred to in the deed, Mallett having thus seventy-five hundred acres in all, six thousand of which were subject to the mortgage. The mortgage was produced, and the holder then filed a petition for partition in the State Court, which was resisted on the ground that the mortgage did not cover the settlers' lots. The case was severely contested, but the court overruled the objections and granted the petition, and then affirmed the partition, which assigned the lots in question to the petitioner. Other suits were brought, all of which met with a like fate, the court being fixed in the purpose of dooming all the settlers' lots owned at the time " of the mortgage, as forming a part of the land included therein.

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

In 1842 Mallett, having fought the State Court for some eight years without success, by advice of counsel, assigned all his interests to his son David, who moved to New Hampshire and brought his suit of right for the two lots in question in the Circuit Court of the United States, where it was tried before Judge Story with success to his side. From his decision the case went up to the Supreme Court of the United States, which in January, 1846, affirmed the judgment of the Court be- low and gave Mr. Mallett his land free from all adverse claim; thus overruling the whole series of decisions in the State Court, and estab- lishing his title as good and valid. W. P. Fessenden and A. W. Paine were counsel for Mallett in United States Court, and Judge Preble, Fessenden, and Deblois, for Foxcroft. In the State Court F. Allen and T. P. Chandler appeared for Mallett, and Abbott & Rogers for the College.

On February 2, 1832, Township No. 4, in the Second Range of townships east of the Penobscot River and north of Bingham's Purchase, was incorporated into a town by name of Lee. The act of incorporation is on the records of Lee attested by John A. Hyde, Town Clerk.

Wherein Lee obtained its name thus runneth the legend : Had it been called for its most prominent name of river or stream it would have been doubtless called Matta- keunk, but bears better a short English name. It is said that Stephen Lee, a worthy citizen of the borough, suggested, as some say, his name, while others say the modest gentleman suggested the name of our patriot Revolutionary General Lee, and to insure the success of his patriotic suggestion offered to treat with a barrel of rum, which in those days was not so dear in price as at present, and doubtless was sacrificed, though my inform- ant maketh not certain that part of the story, but rather inclineth to that fact.

The first town meeting was held April 11, 1832, at James Merrill's barn for the election of officers. Abiel Cushman was elected Clerk; Winslow Staples, Joseph W. Hall and Caleb Wilbor, Selectmen, Assessors, and Over- seers of the Poor; Samuel Marlton, Treasurer; and Albert S. Getchell, Constable. Other town officers were chosen the 25th of the same month, and the following moneys raised: $1,000 for highways, $150 for schools and $75 to defray town charges.

In 1832 Lee had sixty-one voters.

The town has always made good provision for schools, suitable amounts being voted year by year for their sup- port.

March 14, 1845, the State Legislature passed an act incorporating Lee Normal Academy. The incorporators were Joseph Mallett, Shephard Bean, William Douglass, John Gott, James Merrill, Liberty W. Bacon, Arthur Prentiss, Levi Moulton, and Abiel Cushman. At their first meeting, May 3, 1845, William Douglass was chosen President of the Board of Managers, Shephard Bean Secretary, James Merrill Vice-President, and Joseph Mallett Treasurer. Trustees were added, and commit- tees appointed for the selecting of building site and ma- terial; and a resolution adopted looking to the opening of a school the September following. In 1847 a seal was adopted, representing a school-room with students seated and the preceptor at his desk with a book in his hands in the attitude of communicating instruction, with the name Lee Normal Academy on its margin. Previ- ous to the erection of the Academy, the people of Lee

got together one July 4th and put up the frame of a high school-house near the Elm House, but did nothing more about it.

The Principals of the academy, in order of service, have been : Joseph M. True, William S. Green, Mr. Blackwell, Daniel Crosby, Elliot Walker, Jabez H. Woodman, S. W. Matthews, Joseph M. True again, A. N. Willey, G. A. Stewart, George W. Hall, J. H. Sawyer, G. A. Stewart again, Marion Douglass, and Leander H. Moulton, who is now serving the institution.

Among the students at the school, who subseqently became more or less prominent, are the following: C. A. Cushman, attorney ; J. E. Estes, attorney ; L. A. Stanwood, attorney ; P. A. Getchell, Judge of Probate, Bangor; Horace Hanson, M. D .; J. L. Budge, M. D .; Isaiah Alden, M. D .; Fred Smith, editor ; Madison J. Bowler, editor ; Joseph Bowler, Roswell Leavitt, Cyrus A. Hanson, Benjamin Averill, Representatives in State Legislature; Hiram Stephens, County Commissioner ; G. S. Bean, Warden State Prison. Chester H. Whittier is Director of the Academy. The number of scholars in the town in 1881 was 355.

The Springfield line road was accepted in 1845.

An agent was voted for to sell liquors.

Three hundred dollars was appropriated to build an upper story to the town hall ; it was also voted to admit all religious denominations, without distinction, to the hall.

The churches seemed not to have been in accord as to the use of the hall, so that, in 1846, by a vote, one-fourth of the time the use of the hall was given to the Calvin- istic Baptists, the Methodists and Congregationalists, the Universalists, the Free-will Baptists.

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History of Penobscot County, Maine; with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 220

Author: Williams, Chase & Co., Cleveland (Ohio) Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Cleveland, Williams, Chase & Co. Number of Pages: 1100

Author: Williams, Chase & Co., Cleveland (Ohio)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Cleveland, Williams, Chase & Co.
Number of Pages: 1100