History of Penobscot County, Maine; with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 222

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 222

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

died many years since and Mr. Jackson is now living with his third wife, whose name was Paulina B. Towle, formerly from Farrington, Maine. She had three sons, Daniel, of Lee; B. H. Towle, of Sherman, Maine; and A. B. Towle, of Lee. Mr. Jackson was in the War of 1812, and a physician in the late war. He has been a great hunter in his day, and killed twenty-two bears besides other large game. He is now in his eighty-sixth year.

One of the early settlers in this county was Captain James Budge, who came from Massachusetts and settled in the present town of Brewer, or Eddington. He had four sons: James, a sea captain; Thomas, Daniel, and Francis H. Francis H. Budge, father of James T., married Abigail Smith, of Hermon. He lived in several towns in this county-Garland, Levant, Glenburn (for- merly called Dutton), Springfield, and No. 4 (now called Lakeville), where he died in 1874. Mrs. Budge died in 1848. James and Abigail Budge had ten children, eight of whom lived to maturity, viz: James T., John S., now of Springfield, Maine; George B., in Springfield; Daniel, also of Springfield; Gibson S., now of Lakeville, Maine; Charles L., deceased; Arthur P., now in Minne- apolis, Minnesota; and Harriet M., of Bangor. James T. Budge, the oldest of this family, was born July 25, 1824, in Levant, Maine. He spent his early days on the farm, and in early manhood learned the blacksmith's trade. After becoming of age he worked at that business about sixteen years in this town. In 1863 he engaged in trade and continued at that business for fifteen years, when he sold out and again went into blacksmithing with his son, which business he is now following. He married Nancy G. Clifford, daughter of George C. and Mary P. Clifford, of Dover, Maine. They have seven children living, having lost one. Their names are: Julia A., now Mrs. George W. Goodwin; James L., now in Sears, Michigan; Sophia E., wife of George D. Stock- well, of East Eddington; Melvin E., now with his father in business; Adella L .; George C., and Harriet S. The name of the one that died was Mary E. Mr. Budge has been Town Treasurer of his town, and Constable.

John E. Ludden is a son of John B. Ludden, origi- nally from Turner, Maine. He was a son of Joseph Lud- den. John B. Ludden married Hannah Woodbury.

They had six sons and two daughters, viz: Louisa, now Mrs. Hiram Stevens, of Carroll, Maine; Sydney, deceased; John E .; Sewall, Cornelia, Lewis V. B., and William A., deceased; and Edwin A., now of Lee. John B. Ludden came from Pownal, Maine, in 1834, and settled where John E. now lives. There was a small field cleared but no buildings. It is said that Mrs. Ludden and her daughter Louisa were the first women who came into this town in a carriage of any kind. They came ere the ice melted in the spring, or they could not have ridden. Mr. Ludden died April 12, 1876, and Mrs. Ludden August 2, 1881. John E. Ludden, the second son of this family, was born June 13, 1823, in the town of Can- ton, and came here with his parents, at the age of eleven. He settled with his father on the old homestead, where he now lives. In 1849 he married Susan Averill, daughter of David and Mary Averill (nee Mary Lee). This couple have had five children, three sons and two daughters- Sewell R., Clarence E., Louis E. (now in Washington Territory), Anna M., and Lucy E. Mr. Ludden's farm is about three miles from Lee village, on the Springfield road, where he owns about three hundred acres of land.

James G. Ames, of Lee, is a son of James and Mar- garet Ames (nee Randall). They came here from Litch- field, Maine, in 1836, and settled on the farm where James G. Ames now lives. They had five children- Amanda, deceased; America W., of Lee; Eleanor, wife of John R. Hall, of Farmington, New Hampshire ; James G .; and Oraville, now Mrs. Charles Kneeland, of Forest City, New Brunswick. James Ames died on the old place in 1844, and Mrs. Ames died January 18, 1862. James G. Ames was born October 9, 1827, in Liv- ermore, Maine, and came here with his parents when nine years of age. He married Joanna Jackson, daughter of Godfrey and Cyrene Jackson, of Lee. They have five children-Charles F., now in Snohomish City, Washing- ton Territory; Milton H., now of Lee; Edson C., James W., and Adla E. Mr. Ames has always been a farmer. He now resides on a part of the farm which he helped to clear up. It is about two and a half miles from the village of Lee. He owns one hundred and fifty acres of land. At the present time he is a member of the Board of Selectmen.

MATTAWAMKEAG.

DESCRIPTION.

Mattawamkeag is a fine, large town, in the Penobscot valley, northernmost in the county of all the long line of towns upon the east bank of the river. It is bounded on the north by Molunkus, and about two miles breadth of Macwahoc Plantation, in Aroostook county; on the east by Kingman; on the south by a strip of Webster Planta- tion and by Winn, and on the east by the Penobscot, beyond which is Woodville Plantation. At the north- west it corners upon Medway, at the southwest upon Chester, which are the only towns cornering upon its corners.

Mattawamkeag is forty-six miles from Bangor, in a straight line up the Penobscot valley. It is separated by only Kingman and Drew Plantation, ten miles breadth, from the northeast corner of the county and from Wash- ington county, and Woodville is the only organized plan- tation or town between it and Piscataquis county on the west. Its north line is the longest, being six and one- half miles; the east line a little less than five and one- half miles; the south line nearly six miles; the boundary on the Penobscot five and two-thirds miles in length. The narrowest width of the town is from the mouth of the Mattawamkeag River to the east line of the town, a little more than five miles. A short jog occurs in the north line of the town, at the corner of Molunkus and Macwa- hoc Plantation. The town contains somewhat less area than an even surveyed township.

Mattawamkeag includes no ponds or lakes of size, and not very many streams. Such as there are, however, are important; and the town is in general, sufficiently well watered. The most useful of these streams is the Mat- tawamkeag River, which, itself taking an old Indian name, gives its own designation to the town. It rises in Aroos- took county and enters Penobscot near its northeast corner, in Drew Plantation, flowing thence in a winding course through Kingman, and entering Mattawamkeag a mile and a quarter above the southeast corner. It flows thence in a southwest direction to the border of Winn, below which it dips in two successive short arcs, and then makes a nearly straight push northwest for the Penobscot, into which it debouches at Mattawamkeag village, about the same distance above the southwest corner of the town as that where it entered above the op- posite corner. It receives no tributaries from the south- ward in this town. Half a mile from its entrance into Mattawamkeag it takes the Whiton Brook, a stream which rises four miles to the northwest, near the road into Macwahoc, and receives a tributary of about three miles length from nearly the same direction shortly be- fore reaching the Mattawamkeag. Half a mile further

the river receives another but shorter affluent. It has a total course in and just below this town of about seven miles, and is exceedingly valuable in the operations of the lumbermen, being a broad and otherwise favorable water for their purposes.

The Mattaseunk Stream is another important affluent of the Penobscot which comes down from Aroostook county through Molunkus, striking the county line one and three-fourths miles from the north-central corner of Mattawamkeag, flowing in a pretty large arc across the same angle of the town, being nearly two and one-fourth miles from the corner at the crown or southeast part of the arc, and reaching the river near School No. 3, about as far from the northwest corner as the point of entrance of the stream into the town. It is also a very valuable channel, in the working of the north woods. At what may be called the crown of the arc, a mile or more from the mouth of the Mattaseunk, a tributary of three miles' length, rising near the middle of the town, is received from the southeast, which in its turn takes in a small af- fluent from the north, heading in the edge of Molunkus, These two large streams, with their tributary waters, and two petty affluents to the Penobscot within half a mile above the mouth of the latter, and one more half a mile above the mouth of the Mattawamkeag, exhaust the list of the waters of this town.

Mattawamkeag, notwithstanding it is so far to the north- ward, almost on the border of the wilderness, has natural advantages which, together with the location of the re- pair shops of the European & North American Railroad at the station, have given it, contrary to the precedent af- forded by nearly every other part of the county, a steady growth almost from the beginning. During the last twenty-one years (it was only incorporated as a town in 1860) it has increased about one hundred every decade, and during the years 1870-80 just one hundred. The population is still almost altogether settled along the river road, which takes in this town, at least between the two large streams, the name of the Mattaseunk road. The old military trail to Houlton, having followed the Penobscot all the way from Bangor, leaves the river at Mattawamkeag station, and strikes off northwestward, crossing the county line a mile and three-fourths from the northeast corner of the town, passing on to Molunkus village, and thence through Aroostook county to Houl- ton, not again touching the Penobscot. The section of this road from the station to the town line has as yet but infrequent settlements. A mile out of the village a neighborhood road runs off east about the same distance. East-northeast, or southeast of its terminus settlements are very rare. The river road, however, is well settled

894

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

up, and has upon it not only the station but a cemetery near, with public hearse-house attached, and two school- houses. About two-thirds of a mile south of the Mat- taseunk it passes close to the Boom Islands, a little clus- ter of three, which are the only islets in this part of the river.

Mattawamkeag village is at the crossing of the stream of that name, on the north bank, and about one-third of a mile from the Penobscot. The railroad, which has followed closely the river road into the town, here di- verges at almost a right angle, and runs off east and north of east into Kingman, making no station in the eight and one-fifth miles to that village. It has at Mattawamkeag its machine and repair shops, freight and passenger- houses, and turn-table, making this place the most im- portant on its line, except Bangor, It is also important for stage connections, daily stage-wagons running hence to Patten, with connections there for Fort Kent, Houl- ton, Island Falls, and other points. The place has a Methodist Episcopal society, a public school-house, two hotels, and the promising beginning of a business quarter.

HISTORICAL NOTES .*

Mattawamkeag was formerly known as Township No. I, East Indian Purchase, as Woodville was No. 2, West Indian. Although receiving its first settlers nearly as early as adjoining townships, and long a gateway into Aroos- took county on account of the Military Road being built through it at an early day, and also because it has a long stretch of navigable water from the Penobscot by the Mattawamkeag, yet it is only very recently that it was in- corporated into a town. The advent of the white man here was in 1829, when Colonel Stanley erected a log cabin or shanty for the accommodation of man and beast engaged in hauling supplies for the lumbermen over the frozen roads of the Penobscot ice. It was closed up during the summer season, and he soon left it for Houl- ton, after selling it to Milliken and John Rollins. It was built on the north side of the Mattawamkeag, the Military Road afterwards built being down the river from it, and was between the "logan" and the river. In 1829 the United States Government commenced building the Mil- itary Road from Lincoln, its southern terminus, to Houl- ton, and completed it as far as Mattawamkeag that year. As the lumbermen would take up in a bateaux, in the fall, sufficient supplies to last until the river froze over, the teams would haul the bulk of it on the ice, and on the rough woods road following the river which was quite good in winter, and in the spring the bateaux would come down both the Penobscot and Mattawamkeag Rivers. The meagre accommodations of Millikin and Rollins did not suffice for the demand made upon them. This is shown by the experience of a party on their way to the forks of the Mattawamkeag, who had to accept the hospitality of Milliken and Rollins for a night. The ladies slept in the only private room, two on the bed and two on an improvised bed on the floor near the huge fire. In the year 1830 Captain George Waite, who had been employed in hauling supplies to the lumbermen,

bought out Milliken and Rollins, Milliken going I know not whither, but Rollins went up to the forks of the Mattawamkeag, thirty miles toward Houlton, where until recently his children resided. Waite continued to keep a house of entertainment, and soon purchased some land and erected a frame house a little further north, above the creek.

In 1830 James Penly and George Wallace, of Oldtown, erected a hotel building on the present site of the Matta- wamkeag stage house, and which forms the ell part of that hotel. Soon after they sold to Thomas Pratt, of Oldtown, and I think that Ira Wadleigh owned an inter- est in it. Pratt finished the buildings and shortly sold them to Joseph L. Kelsey, of Williamsburg, Piscataquis county. In 1834 Joseph L. Kelsey surveyed and lotted Mattawamkeag, leaving a mile square along that river for a village. He bought much of the desirable land, includ- ing that where the hotel stood, and having enlarged the buildings, let his brother-in-law, Edward G. Sturgis, keep the hotel until 1835, when Kelsey sold the hotel and land to Asa Smith, who moved there from the forks of the Mattawamkeag, since called Haynesville, thirty miles nearer Houlton, where he had been keeping hotel for five years. Asa Smith came from Androscoggin county ; his wife was Lovisa Haynes, daughter of David Haynes and a sister of Alvin Haynes, who was then and a long time previous, a mail-carrier from Bangor to Houlton. Mr. Smith became an important adjunct to the commu- nity of Mattawamkeag. He was Justice of the Peace, mail-carrier, postmaster, merchant, and hotel-keeper.

In 1835 Kelsey and Sturgis left town, and only two other families alone remained. George Waite then was a farmer, hotel-keeper, and owner of teams. He had a house up the road, where there is an old cellar hole, with a barn still standing on the farm of William Willey, at the foot of the lower terrace of Webb Hill. Webb Hill is a steep rise, named after the contractor of Port- land, father of Nathan Webb, who built the Military Road at that point, and who got so deeply into debt, as Nathan affirms, that it took him twenty years to clear himself from it. The other dweller there was James W. Thompson, who carried the Bangor and Houlton mail. He was probably the first to carry mail on the Military Road. He built the house now standing just north of the store of Libby & Stratton, known as the McDonald House. The first school-teacher was a sister of Mr. Thompson. Mr. Thompson left soon after, and David Haynes moved there from Chester in 1837. About that time Dr. Daniel Lumbert moved from Readfield, Kennebec county, and made a clearing on the Military Road, on the edge of the Martin Gould place. Its site is now used as a pasture by D. Frank Martin, a son of Asher Martin, to whom Lumbert sold out. The widow of Asher Martin mar- ried Perley Gould, who died in 1880. Their son, Frank Martin, lives here now. Ira Pitman and Alfred Gordon made a clearing and a brief sojourn in this vicinity on a part of the present Martin farm. Pitman was a son-in- law of that typical Western pioneer, Penuel Shumway, who moved from Howland to Chester, thence to Winn, and finally to Minnesota. Gordon married Elsie Kyle, a

*By B. F. Fernald, Esq., of Winn.

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

daughter of Ephraim Kyle, and moved to Winn. After raising a large family there, he died a lunatic. Previous to this, Colonel Eli Hoskins had owned for several years saw-mills on the Cambolasse Stream in Lincoln. These mills were commenced by the Lindseys, and are now owned by the Webbers, of Bangor. About 1838 Colonel Hoskins, who lived in Oldtown, and George Waite, built a large establishment near the mouth of the present Medway Road, in Mattawamkeag. It was used as a ho- tel, and S. Warren Coombs was the building contractor. Waite and Hoskins kept the hotel until 1846 or 1847. Waite then moved to the lower part of the town, and built the Hamilton Coombs House, near where he had made a clearing. George Sanborn rented the hotel, and con- tinued it as such until 1855, being succeded by Asa Smith, who purchased the property and kept the hotel until 1870. Then the buildings were moved across the road, and have since been used as dwelling houses.

At a very early day efforts were made to improve the water-power at the town, and John Gordon, at an early day, built a mill at Gordon's Falls. The building of this mill and its burning by the Indians in 1812, are recounted in the history of Winn. The location is on the confines of Winn and Mattawamkeag, and below it in both the towns are the old cellar-holes of the Dudleys and other settlers who lived there long after the mill was burned down. Purchases have been made with a view of increas- ing the water-power. The Mattawamkeag dips into Winn twice before it flows into the Penobscot within the territory of Mattawamkeag. When the trouble about the north- western boundary of our county caused soldiers to line the frontier, and a fort and barracks to be constructed at Houlton, that place and Mattawamkeag became memo- rable, and names were given to locations on the Matta- wamkeag that have ever since borne them. Supplies had to be boated up the Mattawamkeag, as well as the sol- diers, in a scow, which made a landing below Gordon's Falls and Scatterac Falls, and this has ever since been known as Scow Landing. A road was cut through the woods then, extending to the soldiers' field, where they encamped near Molunkus Stream, above the Falls, where they embarked again. Further up on the river is a place where a woman accompanying the troops gave birth to a child near where two springs arise. Hence the name of "Female Springs." When the troops reached the forks they went by the "spotted line" to Houlton, some twenty-five miles further. A dam has long been built at the lower pitch of Gordon Falls. It was rebuilt with a fish-way a year or two since.

David Bunker, who located in Chester in 1827, went in 1832 to Mattawamkeag, to Mattakeunk Lake, in town- ship A, Aroostook county, on the Mattakeunk Stream, which flows into the Penobscot some three miles up the Penobscot from the Mattawamkeag. At the foot of the lake he built a dam and a large lumber mill, or rather commenced a mill, and Arsenius Robinson, a New Hampshire man, completed the mill and sold it to John Foss, then of Lincoln. Within four years after this last purchase, extensive improvements were made here. Timothy Fuller, of Lincoln, and Seth D. Remick built a

horse railroad from the Penobscot to the mill, coming out about half-way from the present residence of Hiram Hathorn. A large amount of lumber was manufactured there.

The Fosses run a mill for some time, and Phineas Foss made some clearings on the edge of the river. The Medway road afterward when built found the houses often so far from an average straight road line as to lo- cate many houses in the middle of the fields.

Shortly after a company from Saco built a mill and a dam within half a mile of the mouth of the stream. When completed it fell into the hands of Amos M. Roberts, of Bangor, and was run by John Jackins for several years. A shingle-mill was built there later by Hiram Hathorn. These mills were burnt down in 1870. This property was owned a long time by Woodman & Maling, of Bangor, and run by Hiram Hathorn. In 1879 Harvey Jordon, of Brewer, built a large lumber-mill and bought the shingle-mill erected by Hathorn after the old mill was burnt. In 1838 Samuel Warren Coombs re- moved from Chester to Mattawamkeag, and built where he now lives.

Soon after the town was l'otted out a road was built to accommodate the Mattakeunk neighborhood, and on that road Samuel Briggs, who removed from Winn, made a farm. Franklin Chesley made a farm in 1839 farther up the road. John Jackins built a house at the mill. Within the next decade some half a dozen farms were made and houses built along the Penobscot River, in- duced by the milling operations in Mattakeunk. The leading men there for a while seemed to be Phineas Foss and John Jackins, the latter a brother of Mrs. Samuel W. Coombs.

Early after Hoskins' connection with Mattawamkeag's business he had cleared up or started the present farm of Edward Shaw, Jr., or within a half mile or so of the bridge, but it was not until after 1850 that the present Medway road was built, starting near the bridge and winding along most of the way by the Penobscot River side.

Mattakeunk Lake, though not in Penobscot county, is a great resort for fishermen, especially in the winters.

Below Mattawamkeag village, early after the settlement there, about 1830-36, Charles Stetson built a house which stood in the present dooryard of the present fine residence of the late Asa Smith. The old house is now used as an out-house. Gideon Stetson, of Lincoln, is a son of Charles Stetson, and was the first blacksmith in town.

Joseph Blakemore, the father of George W., and a brother of the wife of Elijah Brackett, the pioneer of Upper Winn, built, about 1842, where George now lives. During the years between 1840 and 1850 three or four other farms were made on the Military Road, toward Winn and Mattawamkeag, extending to within three-fourths of a mile of Winn village.

Above Webb Hill but few other settlements were made, the Bradeens locating above Gould's. Indeed, in the whole about five-mile stretch of road to Aroostook county line hardly five farms now exist, though several

Asa Smith.

STORE AND RES. OF GEO. W. SMITH, MATTAWAMKEAG, MAINE.

RESIDENCE OF THE LATE ASA SMITH, MATTAWAMKEAG, ME.

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HISTORY OF PENOBSCOT COUNTY, MAINE.

old clearings grown up to bushes attest to the pioneer unwisdom and subsequent discouragement and desertion. The most of the way to Haynesville the road goes over a boggy ground, whereas if it went eastward a few miles nearer the valleys of the streams, fine farming lands would have attracted immigration.

Some two and one-half miles above Mattawamkeag village are the sunken bridges on the Military Road, where five bridges have sunk into the soft ooze whose depth has never been discovered, though the length of the bridge has been shortened by filling up. About a mile above Mattawamkeag a new road goes into a settlement commenced near 1860; this, with the exception of a short road of two or three miles up the Mattawamkeag River, and the old soldiers' road, being all the roads and settlements in Mattawamkeag off the Military Road and Medway road, excepting the Davis road.

As immigration into the upper country continued Mattawamkeag became the gateway to upper Penobscot and the Aroostook country, and its popular stopping place, Smith's hotel, was full; Hoskins and Waite's well employed-afterwards kept by George Sanborn until bought by Smith; and a house built by Josiah Cripps was afterwards enlarged to a hotel by the Fisks, but a few rods down the river from Smith's, also kept by Alvin Hoskins in 1847, and later by Josiah Snow, Samuel Dudley, Lewis Brown, and by Stratton, and at present by Charles Green and his son-in-law, Greenwood. The Smith family long kept the hotel, the Mattawamkeag stage house, from 1847 to 1852. It was then kept by Holder Sanford, Isaac Bartram, John R. Adams, Smith & Wing, then by Henry Wing, a son-in-law of Smith; then by George Parks. It has since changed hands many times, and at present is managed by Simon B. Gates, who purchased it in 1811.

The first known postmaster in the town was Asa" Smith, who was early appointed, though there may have been some one before, during the "salt-box" period of our mails. Postmasters since Smith have been Holder Sanford, Asa Smith again, George W. Smith, then the present incumbent, David S. Parker, who is also Station Agent on the European & North American Railway.

Of merchants, Beniah Sturgis, a brother of the hotel keeper, E. G. Sturgis, traded in 1833-34, and seems to have been the first in town. Asa Smith, while connected with the hotel, was also in trade. Between 1846-50 Al- vin Haynes was in trade. Gilbert, Kirbg & Co. and J. B. Foss for two or three years; Hiram Haines, brother of Henry Haines; G. W. Smith, H. W. Fisk, and many others. In 1872 Asa Smith erected the present large store and dwelling house, where George W. Smith re- sides and trades. About the same time Henry W. Fisk built the present store of William H. Libby, who took in the present year Orlando A. Stratton, a son of Lewis F. Stratton, who had traded there previous to Libby.

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History of Penobscot County, Maine; with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 222

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