USA > Maine > Piscataquis County > History of Piscataquis County, Maine : from its earliest settlement to 1880 > Part 2
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
ufacturing enterprises. The flowage of all these is into the Piscataquis, except Center Pond and Boyd's Lake; Kings- bury Pond being the source of the south branch of that river.
Another strange feature in these water sheds is seen in the course of Main-stream. It rises in the north part of Garland, passes on westward into Dexter, near its northern line, receiving the outlet of Center Pond, and other streams in Sangerville, Parkman and Wellington, and falls intoMoose Pond in Harmony. This pond vents its surplus waters into the Sebasticook, and down this, into the Kennebec. Main- stream runs nearly parallel with the Piscataquis, in the opposite direction, and only about seven miles distant from it.
Black Stream and Alder Stream rise near the south line of Dover; and both of them flow northward, making available mill sites, both emptying into the Piscataquis.
The Piscataquis is the most note-worthy of its rivers. It suggested the name of the county. Upon this river the first settlements were made, and upon this and its branches are nearly all its settled towns. Upon its head waters, pines and spruces, of a most excellent quality, abounded, and early at- tracted the notice of lumbermen.
CHAPTER IV.
NATURAL RESOURCES.
THIS county has large tracts of fertile and easily culti- vated soil, only a part of which has been well worked, and fully developed. Its first crops were unsurpassed in New England. Then it had only "to be tickled with the hoe, to laugh with a harvest." Corn and potatoes, grain of all kinds, and grass, sprang from its virgin soil in prodigal luxu- riance. Nor was its primeval fertility soon exhausted. Its present show of crops declares that good husbandry will well
repay the laborer's toil. Its intervals are beautiful and abundantly productive, while its uplands are far less encum- bered with stones, than similar soil in the western parts of this State. In the agricultural quality of the soil rests the chief and abiding productive resource of this county ; and the farm the orchard and the garden must ever be the main re- liance for pecuniary prosperity.
This county could once boast the most valuable timber lands in the State, with streams sufficient to float out their productions. But now, like other timber tracts in Maine, its pine is well nigh exhausted, though spruce, hemlock and cedar still abound, and promise to. In its hard wood growth, it also has immense resources. Birch, maple and ash, bass- wood, poplar and white birch are abundant, and are now turned to good account for various manufacturing purposes.
WATER POWER. No part of our State is better supplied. Nearly every town now settled has one or more good mill privileges, most of them, several, as the more detailed ac- count of the several towns will evince.
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
SLATE also abounds in immense quarries, and the opening and working of these give much scope to productive in- dustry. As early as 1828, Hon. Moses Greenleaf discovered a vein of argillite slate extending across the county. It has been opened in Brownville, Williamsburg, Barnard, Foxcroft, Monson, Blanchard and Kingsbury. One of these quarries, near Mr. Greenleaf's former dwelling, is successfully worked by A. H. Merrill Esq., and he has orders for slate from the Western States, and sometimes from Europe. He took the first premium on roofing slate, at the Centennial Fair in Philadelphia.
GRANITE. This county abounds with boulders and quar- ries of superior granite, much of it easily wrought out. It has been extensively used for various purposes; but as other building material is readily procured, it has not been used in the entire structure of buildings.
. LIMESTONE is found in Abbott, Guilford, Foxcroft and Dover, from which a good fertilizer can be obtained; and which the soil much needs, in order to produce good crops of corn and grain. A certain kind is found in Foxcroft and Dover, which is used to advantage in the smelting of iron ore at the Katahdin Iron Works.
MINERALS. An extensive mine of iron ore is found in No. six, ninth range, which has been wrought by the Katah- din Iron Works Company. This has furnished a large amount of employment. Since the Bangor and Piscataquis Railroad has been operating, the transportation of its products by teams has been reduced to sixteen miles, and it may soon be farther reduced.
A bed of copperas has quite recently been struck, beneath the stratum of iron ore; and if this is as extensive as it prom- ises to be, it will add another article of value and of profit to its productions.
The Iron Ore is found at the foot of one of the Ebeeme
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NATURAL RESOURCES.
Mountains, called Ore Mountain, and is also near the west branch of Pleasant River, and of the outlet of a small lake which sleeps beneath the shadow of the mountain.
Gold, silver and copper, in small quantities, were found in a ledge on the John Bennett farm in Guilford; and sanguine expectations raised that rich deposits were concealed beneath. A company conditionally purchased the location, and made large expenditures in tunnelling a long way into the hill, but no vein was struck, and the enterprise was abandoned.
ANIMALS. In early times wild beasts abounded in these forests, affording attractive game to the hunter. The moose was the largest in size, the most imposing in mein, and most desirable for food, of all. These are still occupants of the northern forests, and the killing of them is prohibited in the breeding season. Deer have been occasionally met, while wolves have ever been few and far between. Bears were once numerous, and in the early settlements often "made the night hideous," but were never known to attack a person, though they invaded the ripening cornfields and the sheep pastures. They still prowl about, and at times are decidedly troublesome.
About fifty years since, the loup-cerviers were more daring and rapacious than the bears, in destroying sheep, but their day was short, they soon departed.
The beaver was once here, and caught by the old hunters; but now they are unknown. The fox, sable, musquash, mink and such animals, are still found in diminished numbers.
The partridge, the pigeon and the duck, of all the feathery tribes, afford the most delicious food, and best repay the huntsman, though the sportsman can find keen entertain- ment in the chase of the loon, wild goose, eagle, crow and hen-hawk.
FISH. The lakes and rivers of this county once abounded with excellent fish. Alewives ascended the Piscataquis in immense quantities, and were dipped out. and left to decay
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
in heaps upon its banks, in mere wantonness. Proposals to choose fish-wardens, and regulate the business were treated with ridicule. Salmon, too, ran up the main river, and its principal branches, affording rich supplies of fresh provisions to the early pioneers. The building of mills and dams has proved to be an obstruction, yet they were found below Fox- croft dam as late as 1825. Now they are nearly unknown in this river. Trout of the largest size, and of the most deli- cious flavor, were found in its lakes. In Moosehead, the largest were caught, and in Sebec Lake and Hebron Pond some of good size and quality were usually taken; these are not yet exhausted.
CHAPTER V.
SALES, GRANTS AND SURVEYS.
After the war of the Revolution, and the adoption of our National Constitution, both the National and State govern- ments, were deeply in debt, as they now are. But the State of Massachusetts had a wide domain of unsettled lands, all in the district of Maine. To avoid oppressive taxation, the State government resolved to put these into the market, to raise a revenue from their sales, and to make them taxable.
Commissioners had been appointed soon after the close of the war, to investigate the claims of settlers, and of other claimants ; and these earlier titles had been adjusted. The State adopted a "lottery scheme," selling tickets for a cer- tain price, which would draw a proportionate amount of wild land, in some specified township. By this way large portions of eastern lands lying between Union River and the Prov- ince line were disposed of. This waked up a lively interest in wild land, and from 1785 to 1810, a smart land speculation was in full blast, in which the State won considerable profit. But it was soon found that this was crowding too much wild land upon the market, that settlers could not be found to occupy it, and then it wound up this method of disposing of it.
A land office was established, but instead of a Land Agent, a Committee of three was appointed to conduct the business, and they sold townships, or small tracts, on certain estab- lished conditions. In each township sold, the purchasers were required to reserve four lots of three hundred and twenty acres each, of average quality and quantity, for pub- 3
2
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
lic uses ; to wit, one lot for the use and benefit of the State itself; one, for the first minister of the gospel that the town after its incorporation would vote to settle as their minister ; one to produce a ministerial fund, the income to go for the annual support of the acting ministry in town; and one for a school fund, the income of which should go for the support of common schools.
Purchasers of townships were required to have a certain number of actual settlers residing in the township by a spec- ified time. Some, however, failed, and by petitioning the General Court, obtained an extension. Hallowell and Lowell found this necessary, to confirm Vaughan's title to Charles- ton and Dover.
These sales required the running out and numbering of new townships. Toward the close of the last century a wide breadth of wild lands was surveyed and prepared for sale. ' Plans and minutes of surveys, now in the land office show, that Ephraim Ballard and Samuel Weston, run out the sixth range, the most southerly tier of towns in Piscataquis County, from Lagrange to Wellington, in 1792. Also that Mr. Weston, aided by his brother Stephen, run out the seventh and eighth ranges in 1794. The eighth range is now known to be seven miles wide or more; why, it does not appear, but it gives its included townships an increase of acreage. Grants in the ninth range attribute the running out of that range to Mr. John Boardman, but the date there- of is not known. The lotting out of each township will be noticed in its respective history.
During this same period the State pursued a very liberal policy toward institutions of learning, and other works of public improvement. Large grants were made to Colleges and Academies ; also to aid in opening canals, turnpikes, and free bridges over large rivers, and public roads through un- settled places. Several townships in this county were thus granted and conveyed by their grantees to their respective purchasers.
In the act, incorporating Bowdoin College, passed June,
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SALES, GRANTS, AND SURVEYS.
1794, five full townships of the unappropriated lands of the State, were granted to that institution. They were to be se- lected and laid out under the direction of the State Commit- tee for the sale of wild lands. The grantees were to reserve, in each township, three lots of three hundred and twenty acres each, for public uses, and to have fifteen families settled in each township within twelve years of the passage of said act. In pursuance thereof, the College Committee selected the Dixmont township; and also four contiguous townships on the north side of Piscataquis River, Numbers Four, Five, Six and Seven in the Seventh Range, now known as Sebec, Foxcroft, Guilford and Abbott.
At a later date the General Court granted two other town- ships, numbers seven and eight, tenth range, lying east of Greenville, to the same institution. The Monson township was granted, the west half to Hebron Academy in this State, the east half to Monson Academy in Massachusetts. One-half of the Greenville township was granted to Saco Academy, and the other half to Saco free bridge ; and one-half of the Katah- din Iron Works' township was a grant to Warren Academy.
The west half of Medford was a grant to David Gilmore, for making the Dixmont road; and number nine, ninth range, eventually Wilson, was granted to the Massachusetts Medical Society.
Other townships were early sold by the State to individ- uals, and though at extremely low prices, and on liberal con- ditions as to introducing settlers, they sometimes failed to meet their engagements, and the land reverted to the State. Previous to 1820 the State realized only twenty-five cents per acre, as an average price.
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CHAPTER VI.
HOW, WHEN, AND BY WHOM FIRST ENTERED.
IT must be borne in mind that this region, when entered by its pioneers, was remote from other settlements; conse- quently without open roads, or convenient passage by water. Hence some of their greatest hardships. The lowlands and swamps were miry, and, as the snow usually fell early, they would not be frozen and passable till deep snow ob- structed traveling. Hence heavy burdens were brought in on horseback, and on rude "cars", the transportation of which sledding would have facilitated. Hence several of the wom- en who were the first to occupy these wilderness homes, rode with their babes in their arms, on horseback, their hus- bands tracing out a spotted line, which alone marked a dim and winding way. Late in winter, when settlers would fre- quently attempt to move in, the roads would be full of loose snow. Some heavy articles were boated up the rivers to Brownville and Dover, but stemming the rapids was labo- rious, and at the steeper falls they were obliged to unlade their boats, and carry their cargoes around them.
Most of the early settlers from the central and western parts 'of Maine, came by way of Skowhegan (then Canaan), thence to Cornville, Athens, Harmony, Ripley and Dexter. Those from Massachusetts and New Hampshire sometimes took passage by water to Bangor, and found a road to Charleston. By the autumn of 1803, Capt. Ezekiel Chase moved his family from Carratunk to his opening near the present Sebec and Atkinson bridge, with teams ; but Benja- min Sargent brought his on horseback from Bangor, at the
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THE FIRST SETTLERS.
same time. The road through Atkinson to Sebec Mills was opened early, and many of the settlers of Brownville came in by this way. As early as 1804, single horse teams brought families into Amestown; and in 1806 teams came into Guil- ford in the winter; and in the autumn of that year, Capt. John Bennett reached there with a loaded ox-cart. In the fall of 1807, Capt. Samuel Chamberlain and Ephraim Baker moved their families, provisions, and household effects from Bangor to Foxcroft, on an ox-wagon. They were two days in getting from Charleston to Foxcroft, fifteen miles, having to bridge streams and swamps, and often to widen the way be- fore they could pass. Thus detained, they were under the necessity of camping out over night,-quite a rough experi- ence for the women and children, as they had not expected to do it, and were not prepared for it,-while their team had but a scanty supply of fodder.
After a few years, a shorter way from Skowhegan to these parts was opened from Harmony, through the present towns of Cambridge and Parkman. Probably about 1812 this was done, but several years elapsed before it became a good car- riage road. Previous to 1814, a road was cut out from San- gerville to Garland, and this opened a way to Bangor, for the upper settlements on Piscataquis River.
THE FIRST SETTLERS. It may be interesting to know who were the first to break into this "howling wilderness; " to brave the hardships incident to introducing civilized life and progress into these boundless forests ; which of the towns was first settled; and who was the first permanent settler of this county. Certainty, in respect to dates, after so long a period, and after all these first pioneers have fallen asleep, is not easily arrived at, on all points, but the more important have been secured by patient research. The best sustained conclusion may be stated thus: Abel Blood felled the first opening on Piscataquis River, in the Dover township, as early as June, 1799. It is not certain that any begin- nings were made the next year. But in 1801, Moses and
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
Stephen Snow and Benjamin Sargent felled openings in the Milo township; Moses Towne on a part of the Blood purchase ; and Col. J. E. Foxcroft hired Samuel Elkins to fell twenty acres on his newly purchased township; and it is said that Jonas Parlin felled a few acres on the Burrill interval, but did not proceed to occupy it. In 1802, Ezekiel Chase felled an opening in Sebec, Bylie Lyford, in Atkinson, and Phineas Ames, in Sangerville townships, respectively. In 1804, the first openings were felled in Guilford, by Low and Herring, and the next year, one in Abbott, by Abraham Moor, Esq.
Abel Blood, with a hired man, spent the summer of 1800 on his clearing, raising and harvesting a crop. Col. Foxcroft's account of his exploration of Number Five, Seventh Range, confirms this statement. In the spring of 1802 the Townes,- Thomas Towne, the father, Moses, and probably Eli, his sons, -came to their opening, bringing Moses' wife, who camped with, cooked and washed for, them. In the fall, Eli and Mrs. Moses Towne returned to Temple, N. H., but Thomas and Moses Towne continued through the winter, hunting, fishing, and as spring came on, making maple sugar. In the spring of 1803, Eli Towne, with his wife and child one year old, started from Temple, N. H., for the Piscataquis settlement. They reached it May 8, 1803. This may be confidently set down as the first family that moved into the county. In the autumn of 1803, Capt. Ezekiel Chase moved his family into Sebec; Benjamin Sargent, his, into Milo; and Phineas Ames, his, into Sangerville. In the spring of 1804, Bylie Lyford moved into the Atkinson township, and Lyford Dow and Abel Blood, probably, brought their families into Dover. These dates accord with the best data that I have been able to collect, and with the best recollections of the survivors of those early families, excepting the Benjamin Sargent family ·of Milo. And here the reasons which led to those conclu- sions shall be given. That Abel Blood purchased a square mile of land in the Dover township, and located it where East Dover village and its surroundings now are, is unques- tioned. The statement that he felled the first trees on it, in
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THE FIRST SETTLERS.
June, 1799, was recorded when some of the men employed to do it, Seth and John Spaulding, were present. Col. Fox- croft's statement, that he found Blood there in the autumn of 1800, and that he had raised a crop of corn and other veg- etables that year, corroborates that date. Col. Foxcroft also stated that it was in June, 1801, that Samuel Elkins felled the first opening in his township. This is confirmed by the statement of two writers, who give the early history of Dex- ter, to wit, that Samuel Elkins spent the summer of 1801 in building the first mills in Dexter, and that in 1802, his health failed, and his brother Daniel came and finished the mills, and put them into operation. Messrs. Foxcroft and John- son, when they came to explore Number Five, left their horses with Samuel Elkins in Cornville; and as he was at Dexter during the summer of 1801, he could quite conveniently re- pair to the Foxcroft township, and do that job with his work- men, at the proper season.
Reliable records show that Alvin Towne, the child which Eli Towne and wife brought to their home on horseback, was born in Temple, N. H., April 24, 1802, confirming the date of his incoming to be, as Mr. Towne always gave it when living, May 8, 1803.
Ezekiel Chase jr. affirmed that he was five years old when their family moved to Sebec; that it was in the fall of the year; that the Sargent family was at their log-house when they reached it; and that Bylie Lyford's family came the next spring. He also recollected that his older brother Francis, and Moses Towne made maple sugar together, near Towne's opening, the spring before the Chase family moved in, living upon boiled corn and maple syrup. If this was the spring of 1803, Moses Towne and his father had been camp- ing there all winter, but not the year before, and had raised a crop of corn the previous summer. Mr. Ezekiel Chase was born March 6, 1798, and died in Sebec, July 25, 1879, aged eighty-one years and four months,-the last survivor of those families which entered this county in 1803. His brother,
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HISTORY OF PISCATAQUIS COUNTY.
Charles V. Chase, was born in Sebec, July 15, 1804, and this affords us another reliable date.
Bylie Lyford's son, Thomas, was born in Atkinson, Nov. 11, 1804, and the family, it is said, moved there the March previous, making Lyford's removal, March, 1804, and Chase's, in the fall of 1803. But Mr. Henry B. Sargent, son of Ben- jamin, and other members of that family, were quite confi- dent that their removal to Milo was in 1802, but they had no early records that established it. They rested upon the fam- ily tradition, that their brother Nathan, the youngest of the family, was then but two years old. If it was in 1802, he would have been two and a half; if in 1803, three and a half ; large, to be sure, to be brought in his mother's arms. But as she came on horseback from Bangor, and the other children walked, that was the only way that he could come, even if three and a half years old. And Mr. Henry B. Sar- gent, then five or six years old, recollected that they were at Chase's log-house when the Chase family arrived, as stated by Ezekiel Chase jr. So the two families must have come the same year, and the same month. The balance of proof, then, evidently gravitates to 1803; and Mr. Sargent's first entrance to fell his trees and make a beginning, is known to have been when his son Nathan was about two years old. In the records written by one of the Sargent family, several years afterward, it is stated, that on the eighth day of May, 1802, snow fell in this region to the depth of eight inches. Eli Towne and wife were wont to relate that, on their last day's journey to their new home, that same depth of snow fell. This was assuredly May 8, 1803. Though this is not certain proof, it verily looks as if the Sargents antedated their record one year, and that they, like many others, were hon- estly mistaken.
Phineas Ames had a child born in Harmony, in March, 1803; so he had not removed to Sangerville then; and as the tradition runs that his wife did not see a white woman for more than a year after her removal, and as Weymouth and
-
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THE FIRST SETTLERS.
Brockway moved in by sledding, early in the winter of 1804- 5, Ames evidently came in the same autumn as Chase and Sargent, to wit, 1803. And their family tradition was, that Mrs. Ames rode in on horseback, with a babe in her arms, her husband leading the horse from the Dexter settlement, guided by a spotted line only.
A descriptive and historical sketch of the towns constitut- ing this county will now be given, arranged according to the dates of their settlement. The situation and boundaries of each can be learned from the accompanying map.
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CHAPTER VII.
DOVER.
THIS town was originally Number Three, Sixth Range. It is in the southern tier of towns in the county, and lies, except- ing a narrow strip on its northern border, on the south side of Piscataquis River. It contains, according to Greenleaf, 22,444 acres. It is well watered, having three superior mill privileges on the Piscataquis, and another on Black Stream in the southern part of the town. The Great Falls at Dover · village, are occupied by Hon. S. O. Brown's woolen factory and flouring mill. In a distance of three hundred and twenty- five feet, the fall is twenty-three feet, and is estimated to be equal to two hundred horse power. One hundred rods be- low this, there is another fall of six feet, which has been made use of, but is now unimproved. Two and a half miles further down, at East Dover village, there is another fall of eight feet, and the same amount of head. On this dam F. H. Brown has a saw- and grist-mill, and Gray & Co., a wood- pulp, and a pasteboard mill. The Dover South Mills are situated upon Black Stream. A dam twelve feet high flows a large bog, and makes a very permanent water power. This drives a saw-mill, and a shingle machine, which are now known as "Brann's Mills."
Dover is one of the best townships of farming land in the county, has a large extent of interval, and but few lots that are not under improvement. It is the shire town of the county, and the largest in wealth and population, having, according to the census of 1870, 1,983 inhabitants, and a val- uation of $675,000. All of the county offices and court-
DOVER.
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rooms are contained in one substantial, two-storied, fire-proof building. No jail has ever been built, but according to an act of the Legislature, the jail in Penobscot County is used for the confinement of the criminals of the county.
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