USA > Maine > Oxford County > Rumford > History of Rumford, Oxford County, Maine, from its first settlement in 1779, to the present time > Part 10
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The literature of the town is not great, but we have very good schools, and they are generally well attended. The number of scholars from four to twenty-one years of age is three hundred. The town raises three hundred and seven dollars for the use of schools. There is also a fund of forty dollars for the support of schools, arising from the interest of school lands already sold. When the whole right is sold, the interest will make a handsome sum for the support of schools.
There is only one man in the town who has had a full public edu- cation, viz., Rev. Daniel Gould. He has been in this town and in Bethel twenty-eight years, in the work of the gospel ministry. During this time he has paid particular attention to the education of youth and children. He has generally furnished these towns and vicinity with the teachers of their schools. From his unwearied attention and exertion the schools, which, before he came here, were in a miserable condition, are now in flourishing circumstances. He has spent much time in visiting and encouraging the scholars in these and the neighboring towns, and has excited a laudable ambition in parents, youth and children, to promote education and to gain knowledge. He has therefore placed the schools in a respectable situation. He has likewise the satisfaction to see that his labors have been blessed.
A learned ministry is a great blessing to a town or society. Such men are a great stimulus to education, piety and morality. The school laws do not now, as formerly, require the aid of ministers to promote the education of youth and children. Then they were required ex officio to attend the schools, to visit and encourage children and youth in their education, and they were remunerated by a freedom from taxation.
It is a fact that unless the direction of youth and children be duly attended to, we shall never secure our civil and religious privileges, and a free government. Ignorance lays the foundation for absolute monarchy, oppression and slavery. Hence the necessity that every citizen in these States should exert himself to promote the education of youth and children, and to use all means to encourage these important objects.
There has not been public spirit enough in the town to establish a social library. Several attempts have been made to effect such a
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source of useful knowledge. The people seem to have but little taste for reading. It is hoped that this state of things will not last long. Such an institution is extremely valuable in society and affords much knowledge at a cheap rate. There is a small church library in the town, of religious books only. There is also a small female tract society, and it is popular at the present time. It is hoped that it may increase and remain popular.
Peter C. Virgin, Esq., is the only lawyer here. He does much business and is valuable in his profession. Ile is a man of steady habits, a good citizen and a useful member of society.
In this town there are two physicians, Joseph Adams and Simeon Fuller. They are settled in the eastern and western parts of the town. They are valuable in their profession.
The newspapers taken in this town are forty in number. There are two post offices in town. The first of these was established January 1, 1815, at the point. The other is at the lower part of the town and was established October 10, 1825. The Post riders meet at the Point every week, one of them riding from Portland to the Point, and the other from Hallowell to the same place. Another rides from Andover to the Point.
The number of families in the town is one hundred and fifty- seven. There are one hundred and seventy ratable polls and as many voters in the town. The town is increasing in numbers, and will increase in population till the lands suitable for improve- ment shall be occupied.
The inhabitants are generally industrious and enterprising. They are mostly employed in farming, in clearing the land, in making farms from the wilderness, and are generally steady in their habits. There are four who are shop joiners and who do cabinet work, and they display much ingenuity in their employment. There are others who are carpenters and blacksmiths. Two of these do most of the business of this kind and are situated at each end of the town. There are also shoe-makers in the place, some of whom are good workmen.
The most eminent men in town, both in ancient and modern times, are William Wheeler, Francis Keyes, John Thompson, Francis Cushman, Moses F. Kimball, Alvan Bolster and Colman Godwin. There are others who have and do take the lead in busi- ness in town affairs. There are many valuable men in the town, and as is always the case, there are some not so valuable, and some are poor and idle.
The town was first represented in the General Court in 1811, by William Wheeler ; also in 1812. From this year to 1818, the town sent no representative. Peter C. Virgin, Esq., represented the town from 1818 to 1821. This year the representative was Moses F. Kimball, and in 1825, Francis Cushman.
There are several in town who were soldiers in the Revolutionary war. Two only receive pensions. The author of these pages was one of those soldiers. It would seem that if one drew pensions, all should. Those who are the subjects of their country's benefi-
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cence have generally not been the best of citizens ; but those who have been industrious and frugal are otherwise. When all shared the fatigues, labors and hardships in that war, and received but little pay from their country at that time, but at the present time, the country is able to reward them. Their fellow citizens are enjoying the happy fruit of their labors. It is thought that all those soldiers ought to be treated alike and be equally rewarded.
GENERAL REMARKS.
There are no monuments or ancient relies of the Indians in this town, though it is apparent that they were very numerous in this region in former times. But after Lovel's fight, one hundred years ago ; and after the taking of Quebec by General Wolf in 1759, through fear they deserted this part of the country, and there was no danger, at least in this town when it was settled by the English. The first settlers in Bethel during the Revolutionary war, suffered from the Indians, and two of the inhabitants were taken by them and carried to Canada.
Several in this town were engaged in the late war with England. Two died in the army, and one was so badly wounded in the arm that it was amputated. He is yet living and a pensioner. The people in this place were in favor of this war, and exerted them- selves in prosecuting it.
HOWARD'S GORE.
By the politeness of Ezra Smith," Esq., at my request, I am able to give a sketch of Howard's Gore, of which he is an inhabitant. Howard's Gore was purchased of the government of Massachusetts in the year 1792, by Mr. Phineas Howard, from whom it takes its name .; It is in the form of a scalene triangle, and is nearly a right angled triangle. The base is bounded on the northwest on Newry, four miles and one hundred and fifteen poles. The northeast line, being the perpendicular, is bounded on Rumford one mile and one half. The other line or leg of the triangle is bounded on the north line of Bethel, due east and west, being the base of the triangle. It contains twenty-one hundred acres. Three years after he had begun a settlement, Mr. Howard built a grist mill at the outlet of a pleasant pond containing about two hundred and fifty acres, in the centre of the Gore, in an elevated situation among the hills. In this pond are trout. Some iron ore has been discovered in the borders of it, but has not been analyzed. The water from the pond in its winding way to the Androscoggin River, falls about three hundred feet in as many rods, before it reaches the flat ground at the foot of the hill. There are, on its descent, one saw mill, one
*Mr. Smith died Feb. 10, 1846, aged 82 years, and is buried at Rumford Point.
tHoward's Gore and a part of Bethel were united and incorporated as Hanover, Feb. 14, 1:43.
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fulling mill, three grist mills, one clapboard and one shingle machine, and an ample privilege for many other mills and machin- ery by using the same water. There are now eleven families and about seventy inhabitants in the plantation, some of whom have attended to orcharding, which produces apples and some cider."
CHAPTER XIV.
TIIE ANDROSCOGGIN RIVER.
HE Androscoggin is a beautiful river, and the scenery bordering upon it is picturesque and often grand. Persons born and reared upon its banks have an attachment for it which is never weakened in after years, however distant they may wander and what- ever may be the lapse of time. Its broad intervals, decorated here and there with drooping elms, rising into table lands with sunny slopes and backed by wooded hills or craggy mountains, make up a succession of vistas which become indellibly stamped upon the memory. Its course, from the northern forests to the sea, is somewhat eccentric, though its general course, like all our Maine rivers, is from north to south. In size and importance it is the third river in the State, and in the amount and quality of its water power it is second to no other. Taking its rise in the great forest belt between Maine and Canada, it leaves Umbagog Lake in the town of Errol, New Hampshire, and passing through that town and other New Hampshire towns of Cambridge, Dummer, Milan, Berlin, Gorham and Shelburne, it enters the State of Maine in the border town of Gilead. Its course from the lake to Gorham is nearly due south, but when fairly outside the White Mountain range, it turns and makes almost a right angle, and when it enters Maine, its course is nearly castward. Between Milan and Bethel the river falls several hundred feet, the most of it at Berlin Falls.
In the town of Bethel, the river turns to the north until it reaches the south line of Newry, near the mouth of Bear River, when it again changes its course toward the east, forms the dividing line between the lower part of Bethel and Hanover, enters Rumford near the mouth of Ellis River, passes through the town in a general northeasterly direction, making several quite sharp turns, enters
7
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Mexico at the mouth of Swift River, and passes southeasterly through the town and as far as Livermore, and from thence, hy a general southerly direction, to Merrymeeting Bay. While the length of Rumford, from Hanover to Mexico, is only a trifle over seven miles, the river in its eccentric course makes a little over eleven miles in passing through the town.
In its course from the lakes to Merrymeeting Bay, the Andros- coggin passes through varied scenery. For several miles after leaving the Umbagog, its course is through the wilderness, where it encounters numerous rapids, and in Dummer is the most picturesque fall on the river, known as Pontook Falls. Through Milan and a part of Berlin its current is quite sluggish, but before leaving Berlin, the entire volume of water is forced into a narrow gorge only a few feet wide, and the river is almost lost sight of until it emerges at the foot of the precipice, several hundred feet below. After this there is no important fall for many miles, but there are numerous rapids, and in many places the current is swift and strong. Sometimes the mountains and hills are so near the river that there is only room enough for a narrow road along its banks, and then they recede, leaving broad belts of interval on either side. No more charming views can be had anywhere than along the Androscoggin from Gorham, New Hampshire, to Lewiston. The road follows the high banks, and panoramic vistas of mountain, hill, valley, forest and cultivated fields succeed each other, and the broad stretches of interval, with the graceful elms bordering the river as they burst upon the view at each turn of the road, seem almost like an enchanted land.
Through Rumford, the current of the Androscoggin is alternately sluggish and rapid, until the river approaches the east part of the town, and here is the most important fall on the river, and the largest water power in New England. The height of the fall is one hundred and sixty-two feet and eight inches in a running distance of one mile. There is a succession of falls, and along this mile the water can be used for driving mills, many times over. The width of the river at the head of the fall is only ninety feet, and the bottom and sides of the channel are of solid granite. As regards the mass of its water, the Androscoggin is a variable river, due to the mountainous character of its catchment basin at the upper portion, and the extreme nakedness of much of the mountain surfaces which form its water-shed. It rises very rapidly and as
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rapidly subsides ; runs very high in the spring freshets, and very low in the drouths of summer. Rumford Falls has a modifying influence upon the character of the river below in time of freshet. From the narrowness of its channel and the imperishable character of its sides and bottom at the head of the fall, it dams back the water, causing a great rise above and equalizing the flow below. By this means the manufacturing interests below the falls are in a manner protected from the chances of destructive rises of water.
The principal falls on the Androscoggin below Rumford are at Livermore, Lewiston and Brunswick. The falls at Livermore were early known as Rockomeco; those at Lewiston, Amitgonpoutook, afterward Harris' Falls and then. Lewiston Falls. Those at Bruns- wick were called by the Indians Pejepscook, also written Pejepscot. The river at the head of Rumford Falls is six hundred feet above tide water, and at Bethel, opposite the Hill, six hundred and twenty feet. At the State line, it is six hundred and ninety feet ; at the head of Berlin Falls, one thousand and forty-eight feet ; at Umbagog Lake, twelve hundred and fifty-six feet, and at the extreme forest source of the river, three thousand feet. The Androscoggin takes its origin and namne only from the point of confluence of Magalloway River and Umbagog Lake waters. The length of the Androscoggin proper is one hundred and fifty-seven miles, and from the head of Rumford Falls to tide water is seventy-five miles. , At Merry- meeting Bay, between Brunswick and Bath, the Androscoggin mingles its waters with those of the Kennebec, and loses its identity. Several rivers flow into this bay, and hence its name, as stated by some ; but this is not strictly true. It was so named because here was the place of meeting of the different tribes of Indians on the Androscoggin and Kennebec and along the sea-coast. The Indian name of this bay was Quabacook.
The Indians applied different names to different portions of the Androscoggin River, and the various names also have a variety of spellings. From Quabacook (Merrymeeting Bay) to Amitgonpon- took (Lewiston Falls), the river was called by the Indians Pejeps- cook also written Pejepscot, and the falls at Brunswick have ever borne this name. Above Lewiston Falls and away to the lake region, the river was called Ammascoggin, often written Amaris- coggin, and now uniformly spelled Androscoggin. These ortho- graphical varieties are due to the fact that the Indians had no written language, and persons who heard them pronounce the
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names of different objects did not always understand alike, and when writing the word each spelled it as he understood it. It is not probable that our present orthography of the name of this river is correct or represents the Indian pronunciation, but it has come to stay. It has been supposed by some that the river was named in part in honor of one of the early colonial governors of Massa- chusetts, but Governor Andros was not one whom the people would be likely to honor in this way. The meaning of the word which we call Androscoggin, which Captain John Smith, the early navi- gator, wrote Aumoughcougen, and which in colonial records is spelled Amascoggin and Amariscoggin, in the Indian language meant the "Fish Spearing River." The early settlers of Bethel and Rumford generally abridged the word, and called the river "Scoggin." From Merrymeeting Bay to the sea, the accumulated waters of the several rivers were known as the Sagadahoc, and the river was so called by the early voyagers, who learned it from the Indians. The first voyagers up the Sagadahoc to Merrymeeting Bay appear not to have discovered the Kennebec, but followed up the Pejepscot ( Androscoggin) to Brunswick and perhaps to Lisbon. They described the falls which rendered the river unnavigable, and returned home in ignorance of the existence of the noble and navigable Kennebec.
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CHAPTER XV.
THE ANDROSCOGGIN INDIANS.
HE Indians had villages and places of burial in the town of Bethel, the town next above Rumford, and in the town of Canton below, but there is no evidence going to show that they had either in Rumford. That they were often here and spent more or less time here, there is every reason to believe. Arrow heads and spear heads, gouges, chisels, tomahawks and other rude implements all wrought in stone, were frequently found by the early settlers, and are still occasionally unearthed. It is much to be regretted that the Indian name of the great falls in this town has not been preserved. A fall so important must have had a name, and it seems a little strange that the early settlers did not learn it. Some writers have suggested that Pennycook was the Indian name of the falls, but the idea has no substantial foundation. As has been shown elsewhere, the name Pennacook was transferred from Con- cord, New Hampshire, with the prefix of "new," and there is no evidence that the name was known in this region until after the township had been granted to Colonel Timothy Walker and associates. Then the name was applied to the township and sometimes to the falls.
When the first settlers came, the Androscoggin abounded with salmon, and there is no doubt that a notable fishing place was at the foot of the falls, but what the aborigines called it, or how they designated the place, will probably never be known. Implements of war and for hunting purposes, as well as those for domestic use, found in the region of the falls by the early settlers, show that this was a favorite haunt of the savages, though their stay here was only at intervals. Their homes, where their families remained and where they cultivated broad areas of maize, and where they buried their dead, were at other points on the river. There were few Indians here, except scattering ones, travelling to and fro after the destruction of the Pequaket and Norridgewock tribes, and with the
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exception of the raid into Bethel during the war of the revolution, in 1781, there were no acts of hostility committed by Indians in Maine after the fall of Quebec and the conquest of Canada in 1760. Small parties came here occasionally to fish and to hunt, but they were peaceable and friendly, and seemed desirous of being on amicable terms with the early white settlers.
The Indians on the Androscoggin were called "Anasagunticooks," and claimed the territory from the lakes to Merrymeeting Bay. The Rokomekos were a sub-tribe, and had their headquarters at Canton. There is a curious analogy between the name Anasagun- ticook and the word Amoscoggin, the name by which the river was once called, and it is probable that they have about the same signification. The Androscoggin Indians, as they will hereafter be designated in this work, had several sub-tribes into which they were divided before white men came among them. Those below Lewiston Falls were called Pejepscots. Canton Point appears to have been the headquarters of the Androscoggins, where they are said to have had five hundred acres cleared, which they annually planted to corn. Here were held the councils of the sub-tribes, but a general council place for all the Indians in central and southern Maine was Abagudasset Point on Merrymeeting Bay.
The Androscoggin Indians were more hostile and intractable than any other of the Maine tribes. They took a prominent part in Phillip's war, which broke out in 1675, and made hostile excursions to the settlements along the coast, at Falmouth. Yarmouth, Scar- borough, Wells, and at the towns on the lower Kennebec. Mugg was a noted Androseoggin chief, and with one hundred warriors made a raid on Scarborough in 1676. Colonel Church, the famous Indian fighter, made an attack on the Androscoggin Indians in 1690. Ile captured their fortified place in Brunswick and killed many, but it is uncertain how far up the river he came. They released a number of captives whom the Indians had taken in their raids the year previous. In 1703, Governor Dudley had a confer- ence with the Indians at Casco Bay, and two chiefs, Mesambomett and Wexar, accompanied by two hundred and fifty warriors, repre- sented the Androscoggins on that occasion. About this time. persuaded by the JJesuits, many of the Maine Indians, including a large proportion of the Androscoggins, moved to Canada and settled on the Becancourt and Saint Francois rivers. In the subse- quent Indian wars affecting Maine, the headquarters of the Indians
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were on the above-named rivers, though the Androscoggins as a tribe did not leave the lower Androscoggin River until about fifty years later. During the last Indian war, and about the year 1756, a small force of men was sent up the Androscoggin in whale boats, and penetrated as far as Rumford Falls. If there were Indians in this vicinity at that time, they fied before their invaders, but the party measured distances and took note of the general character- istics of the country.
A treaty was made with the Indians at Falmouth, in 1749, and among the Androscoggins present and who signed the treaty were Sawwaramet, Ausado, Waaununga, Sauquish, Warcedun and Wa- wawnunka. Incited by the French, the Saint Francis Indians, as the amalgamated tribes were called, continued to make raids into Maine. In 1750, they attacked New Meadows, North Yarmouth and New Gloucester, burned buildings, destroyed cattle, and killed or captured quite a number of the inhabitants. At the falls on the Little Androscoggin in Paris, they came across two hunters. One of them, named Snow, shot and killed the chief of the Indians, and was in turn riddled with Indian bullets. Snow's Falls commemo- rate the incident and the name of the brave but reckless hunter. In 1759, Major Robert Rogers, with a party of rangers, attacked and nearly annihilated the Saint Francis Indians, and after this we hear scarcely anything of Indians in Maine. Scattered families lived at Fryeburg and in Canton, and there were the Penobscots and Passamaquoddies in eastern Maine, but their power was broken, and their tribal relations, except in case of the last two, entirely destroyed.
The Androscoggin Indians always claimed that they never con- veyed to the English any of their territory above Rumford Falls. The deed of Worombo to Richard Wharton in 1684, says : "All the land from the falls to Pejepscot, and Merrymeeting Bay to Kennebec, and toward the wilderness, to be bounded by a south- west and northwesterly line, to extend from the upper part of the said Androscoggin uppermost falls," etc. If, by uppermost falls, Rumford Falls are meant, the position taken by the Indians is correct. At any rate Indians continued to hang about Bethel after the first settlers came, and Jonathan Keyes left his two sons with them for a whole winter, when the nearest white settlement was Fryeburg. It is said that one of these sons, Francis Keyes, learned something of the Indian language, and became quite proficient in
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the use of the bow. It has been said, but with how much truth cannot now be known, that it was a desire to be revenged upon the whites for the occupancy of the soil of Bethel, that incited the raid upon the few settlers of that town in Angnst of 1781. Some of the Indians making this attack, were well known to the settlers, had been fed by them and given places to sleep by their firesides, and up to this time had always appeared friendly. One of them named Tomhegan, led the attack.
Persons now living have been favored with the sight of the last two members of the once powerful tribe of Anasagunticook Indians. Molly Ockett was once a member of the Rokomeko sub-tribe, but she went to Canada and joined the Saint Francis tribe. She came from Canada to Fryeburg, and then to Bethel. She lived with an Indian named Sabattis, who when a boy, is said to have been brought from Canada by Colonel Rogers. She travelled through various towns in Oxford county, a sort of tramp, and was well known to many, three-quarters of a century ago. She was in Andover and was present at the birth of the first child. This child was Susan, daughter of Ezekiel Merrill, who became the wife of Nathan Adams, and a resident of this town. Molly Ockett died in Andover at a great age, and was buried in that town. Another, and the last of the Anasagunticooks, was Metalluc, varionsly called "Natalluc" and "Metallic." Of his early history little is known. Lieut. Segar, who was captured at the time of the raid into Bethel, often said he saw him with the Saint Francis Indians when he arrived at their settlement in Canada. He is said to have been banished from the tribe for some misdemeanor, and he settled in the Umbagog lake region, probably near the haunts of his earlier years. He lived in this region a long time, and was visited by many people, including Governor Lincoln. He became blind in 1836, and died six or seven years after, in Stewartstown, N. H. He was probably born on the Androscoggin, and at the time of his death is thought to have been more than a hundred years old. Thus has passed away from this region and from this river and its tributaries, a whole people, who are to be hereafter known only in song and in story. The only evidence that remains to us that they ever lived here, is found in the rude implements buried in the soil and turned up by the plow. These speak to us of their domestic employments, of their hunting and fishing excursions, and of their engagements in deadly strife. They are gone, and whether deprived
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