USA > Maine > Knox County > South Thomaston > History of Thomaston, Rockland, and South Thomaston, Maine, from their first exploration, A. D. 1605; with family genealogies, Vol. I > Part 15
USA > Maine > Knox County > Rockland > History of Thomaston, Rockland, and South Thomaston, Maine, from their first exploration, A. D. 1605; with family genealogies, Vol. I > Part 15
USA > Maine > Knox County > South Thomaston > History of Thomaston, Rockland, and South Thomaston, Maine, from their first exploration, A. D. 1605; with family genealogies, Vol. I > Part 15
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
of their office, began immediately to inquire into the wants and necessities of the town, and issued a warrant for a town meeting to be held at the house of Oliver Robbins on the 29th of July. At this meeting, James Stackpole was chosen moderator; D. Fales, Mathews, Wheaton, Stackpole, and .I. Crockett, were appointed to run the town lines; "and Capt. Israel Lovett, Mr. Samuel Brown, and Lieut. Mathews" to examine the accounts. It was then voted to raise the sum of £100 for defraying charges and paying debts, and to allow the constable 9d. on the pound for collecting. Mathews, Wheaton, and J. Crockett, were chosen a committee for lay- ing out roads; and the sum of £100 was voted for making and repairing roads, to be raised by a tax and expended at the rate of 12s. for a pair of oxen and cart.
The first intentions of marriage were those of David Crouch with Joanna Jordan both of Thomaston, and James Weed of ditto with Annah Williams of Harpswell, entered with the clerk May 9th of this year. Three others only were entered the same year; viz .: "Alex. Jameson of a place called Cam- den with Sarah Blackington of Thomaston, Samuel Brown with Prudence Thompson both of Thomaston; and Samuel Williams of Harpswell with Ruth Lassel of Thomaston."
To guard the coast and islands in Penobscot Bay from the attacks of privateers and marauding parties and to prevent illicit traffic, companies were this year enlisted; one of which, consisting of 67 privates and eight non-commissioned officers, was commanded by Capt. Nathaniel Fales, who, with Benj. Blackington, sergeant, John Blackington and Wm. Thompson, was of this town, and did duty from July 6th to. August 26th.
1778. The sum of £100 voted for town expenses, to- gether with a further sum of £31, 10s. 1d., the town's pro- portion of a tax "granted by the Great and General Court of the State of Massachusetts Bay in the year 1776 (to be as- sessed on the town of Warren and plantations adjacent)" was committed to the constable, Elisha Snow, for collection, Jan. 12, 1778.
Notwithstanding the war and other discouraging circum- stances, some new settlers continued to arrive. About 1778 Thos. McLellan came from Falmouth and settled on George's River on the lot above Simonton's Point; so called from his brother-in-law, John Simonton, who came about the same time from the same place, bought out the possessory title of Abiathar Smith, and settled on this Point and the adjoining lot. Mclellan was a shoemaker, farmer, and master of a
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
coaster, by turns, as business and profit offered inducement. He was remarkable for his strong love of money and econo- mical not to say penurious habits, which in his later years amounted to little less than monomania. He is said to have compelled his hoys to stop the cow-bell every night with a wisp of hay to prevent the tongue from wearing, to whip off the humble-bees from his corn-stalks to prevent the loss of saccharine matter from the sap, and to go through his fields and pluck up every root of white weed, which being a novelty here was then regarded as detrimental to the grass crop. Aside from this peculiar characteristic however, he was an industrious and religiously disposed man, and, becoming a wealthy money-lender, left to be divided among his children a large estate, including, it is said, a full barrel of cents and other copper coins. Simonton also was a sea-captain, and, in the early part, of the Revolutionary War, had been cap- tured in a schooner owned one-half by himself and the other half by his father in Falmouth, was carried to the W. Indies, and kept as a prisoner nine months. At the end of that time he, with nineteen other prisoners mostly masters of other captured vessels, was put on board a prize schooner which had been dismasted and burnt to the water's edge, but now rigged up for this purpose with jury masts, and sent home- wards with a scanty supply of provisions. She got into Charleston, S. C., from which place Simonton, friendless and penniless, found his way home c. foot. Thus deprived alike of his property and employment, he turned his steps hither- ward to attempt the recovery of both. Jonathan Smith from Rhode Island, after marrying at the Fort in 1776, became this year, 1778, a permanent resident in the eastern part of the town (since Rockland) on land back of the lot of his brother-in-law, Jonathan Spear. There, in his secluded situ- ation by the mountains, he found in the cold and dreary seasons that ensued, a plenty of hard work and scanty fare. He and his family once lived six weeks without bread; but, keeping two cows, made out to sustain life by means of their milk eaten with boiled beech leaves, aided by the clams which he dug at Wm. Spear's shore, -going on foot sometimes to Warren for a back-load of alewives, and the next day, perhaps, to Wessaweskeag or even Tenants's Harbor for salt to cure them with, brought home in the same way. Many remon- strated, and especially Oliver Robbins, who told him he would starve to death there; but Smith persevered, until he in a few years had corn and grain in abundance, and this same Mr. Robbins came in a scarce season all the way up there to
11*
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
purchase corn, -the produce of a farm he had thought so worthless .*
At the second annual meeting, March 23, 1778, some change seems to have been made, and Dr. Fales wholly omitted, among the town officers. As he was eminently qualified for the office of town clerk and had discharged its duties the preceding year in a very correct and exemplary manner both legally and chirographically, it is more than probable that political motives rather than any other were the cause of his being dropped. The success of the American arms, in the capture of Burgoyne the preceding autumn, had given increased confidence to the friends of independence; and the alleged conduct of their opponents, in encouraging hostile visits from privateers, had been such as to raise in the community a resolute determination to draw the lines more definitely between friends and enemies, and suffer no official station to be filled by hesitating or suspected persons. Dr. Fales, eminently conservative and law-abiding, had in the beginning of the revolution manifested a leaning toward the royal cause, as it was also natural he should do considering the relation he stood in with the Waldo Proprietors. Of these, Francis Waldo and Secretary Thos. Flucker were in- cluded with the 310 persons late inhabitants of the State, whose property, by an act passed in September, was all con fiscated. As these persons had retired to the enemy, they were called "absentees;" and the Judges of Probate were authorized to appoint agents to administer upon their estates as if the late possessors were in fact dead. An act also had been passed authorizing the arrest of any suspected person, and the oath of allegiance to the United States to be required of him on pain of banishment from the country and of death in case of his return. It is not known that any attempt to enforce this act was made against Mr. Fales; but either at this or some preceding period a party headed by Capt. Gregg and Lieut. Kelloch from up the river came to his house and offered him his choice between pledging himself to the Amer- ican cause or taking a ride upon a rail. He was not a man to do anything on compulsion, and chose to do neither. But his wife, less obstinate or more politic, succeeded in appeas- ing the party by means of a pailful of flip; and some of his sons offering to be sureties for their father's good conduct, they dispersed without further action. Whether this or any similar transaction at this time had awakened the old suspi-
-
* J. Butler (4th) ; Capt. Wm. J. Fales, &c.
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
cion and kindled a fresh resentment, or whether the new con- fidence and consequent zeal of the whig party had operated to exclude him from office, cannot now be ascertained. How- ever this might be, the election resulted in the choice of E. Show, moderator; Stackpole, town clerk; Mathews, Whea- ton, and S. Brown, selectmen; Mathews, Lovett, and S. Brown, assessors; Robbins, constable; Mathews, treasurer; Tolman, T. Smallee, and J. Stackpole, surveyors of high- ways; Jonathan Orbeton, sealer of leather; Snow, surveyor of lumber; Lovett, Isaiah Tolman, Jr., and James Orbeton, tithingmen ; Brown, Wheaton, and Lovett, committee of safety; O. Robbins, Jr., S. Brown, and J. Coombs, hog- reeves ; - all, or nearly all, western emigrants, or genuine Yankees, and who were, or ought to have been, genuine friends of the American cause also. Committees appointed the previous year were requested to proceed and complete the laying out of the town roads and surveying the town boundaries. The meeting was then adjourned to the last Monday of May; at which time the town seems either to have softened in its feelings towards Dr. Fales, or to have found his services were too important to be dispensed with ; as Lieut. Mathews then resigned his offices of selectman and assessor, and Fales was chosen to fill both vacancies.
At a subsequent meeting held the same day to which the last was adjourned, it was voted that fifty pounds be raised for defraying town charges, and that the assessors be allowed 12s. a day for making rates the past year; a sum equal to that fixed for a day's work on the highways, and sufficiently indicative of a considerable depreciation in the paper cur- rency. But since any attempt to depreciate that currency was at this time a penal offence, and there was every patriotic motive for concealing such depreciation, it is probable that the sum fixed was but a meagre and insufficient compensation. According to a scale of depreciation used in the State Treas- urer's office, the value of paper money was, in September of this year, as four of paper to one of silver. At this estimate the 12s. allowed the assessors would be worth in silver only 3s .; and the fifty pounds raised for town expenses would amount to only twelve and a half pounds, or $41,67 ;- a reasonably moderate allowance for one year's town expendi- ture. But the depreciation was constantly going ou, and, according to Williamson, became in the course of this year as thirty to one; which ratio would reduce the day's work to 63 cents, and the £50 for town charges to $5,55. The actual depreciation, however, is not easy to be ascertained, as it
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
was, probably, different in different places, according to the amount of foreign trade carried on. In October of this year, 1778, Capt. Jas. Watson sold 21 hogsheads of lime in Beverly from his sloop at £9 each, and one ditto at £12; but whether put up in the second-hand molasses casks as was the method at first, or in the 100-gallon casks of a later period, we can- not state. At the same meeting £50 were raised for paying a minister, and E. Snow, S. Brown, and O. Robbins were ap- pointed a committee to hire some one. This being in the same depreciated currency, could not go far in the support of public worship; but it was necessary to do something, as all towns were then required, by law, to provide for instruction in the Christian religion, as well as in common school educa- tion.
In neither of these departments, however, did the town as yet and indeed for many years to come, feel able, amid the distresses occasioned by the war and unpropitious seasons, to make much provision for instruction. What schools there were, now as before the incorporation, were got up by private individuals at their own expense. Dr. Fales, from his first arrival, had taught more or less in the old fort or his own house. Other persons, mostly transient, taught in different neighborhoods for short periods. Among these was one. who for many years continued to exercise in this and the neighbor- ing region a considerable influence in education and literature. This was John Sullivan, a native of Dublin, Ireland, who, after an indefinite period spent in teaching and shoemaking between here and Pennsylvania, found his way to this place in a somewhat dilapidated condition, to which one of his habitual intervals of intemperance had reduced him. Land- ing from a coaster at Wessaweskeag in company with one other passenger of more respectable appearance, and calling at the house of Mr. Snow. as the principal one in the place and usually resorted to by strangers, he saw his companion invited to a seat at dinner, whilst he, from his shabby cos- tume, together with his queer and ambiguous countenance, was left behind to wait for the second table. After they had dined, he inquired of Mr. Snow if he knew of any one wish- ing to employ a shoemaker, but was answered in the nega- tive. On asking if there were any other business in which he could get employment, he was told there was none. except that of a school-master, which was then greatly needed. Sullivan observed that he himself had sometimes been em- ployed as a teacher. " If you can satisfy me of your qual- ifications," said Snow, "I can soon get you employment."
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
Sullivan offered to submit to any examination. " Well then," said Snow, "let me ask you one question. What is the ground of Justification?" "Satisfaction for the offence," said Sullivan. "Right! right!" said his host, "that is suf- ficient; go in and take some dinner." And, from that time, an intimate friendship grew up between the two so opposite in character, the one a sober Calvinist, the other a merry and drunken Catholic. The one, at intervals, furnished a home and employment; the other, scientific information and literary entertainment. Sullivan's fund of historical and other anec- dote was inexhaustible ; - he could argue without heat, joke without offence; and many were the bon-mots and repartees their intercourse gave rise to.
It is not known what success the following application, written in a fair and distinct hand, met with, nor, for want of a date, can we determine at what era it was made, though it was doubtless prior to the incorporation of any town upon this river ; and, if " words of learned length and thundering sound" are the only requisites in a school-master, Mr. Rvan certainly ought to have been employed. Here it is: "To the Inhabitants of the Town of St. George's: Gentlemen, permit me to address you with a few lines at yr. publick Meeting, if we seriously reflect on the various Advantages resulting from Education we shall unanimously Conclude that the Knowl- edge of letters is one of the greatest Blessings that the Divine Majesty of Heaven has bestowed upon the Children of Men, learning furnishes us with uncommon preternatural Endow- ments of the mind and leads us to full observation of every . decent Regulation of the Human life, it illuminates our natural faculties to Discern the Source or Origin of action, which Compels or Induces us to Act according to our Duty to God and Man, finally 'tis an Estate that no outward Vio- lence or Arbitrary power can interrupt or take from us, in consequence of so many Advantages it is a duty incumbent on every Parent to Cultivate their Children in Literature and initiate them in the Knowledge of the secret* Writings, that they may have an early taste of the Beauty and Excellency of them. Therefore, Gentlemen, in hopes of yr. General Approbation, I am encouraged to offer my service in scholastic Tuition, that I may have the honor To Instruct your Youth, should I be so happy as to Merit your future Esteem, it would give me the greatest pleasure, I would also most humbly ap- ply to you for the Schoolmaster's Lot in your Town, which if
* Probably meaning sacred.
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
you Grant, will oblige me to make the most grateful Ac- knowledgements, I shall leave it to your Wise Determination, and Wish you success in all your Annual proceedings Whilst I remain your sincere friend and humble Servant.
" Michael Ryan.""
The different and constantly decreasing value of the paper currency, together with the difficulty of raising men for the army, having induced the General Court this year to levy a tax in provisions and clothing, and also men for the army to the number of 2000 in the whole State, this town seems to have been called upon for " two men," only; as appears from the following entry in the town records. "July 23, 1778. At a meeting of the Selectmen ordered that the sum of £14 be paid out of the Treasury of said town to John Adams (a private detached to serve in the State to the first day of Jan- uary next) and also the sum of £5. 5s. for Milage agreeable to a Resolve of the General Court." "August 11th. At a meeting of the Selectmen ordered that the sum of £5, 5s. be paid to Samuel Tolman (a private detached or enlisted as a soldier in the service of this State till the first Day of January next) out of the Treasury of said Town, being for Milage and carrying Packs, agreeable to a Resolve of the General Court." Both of these were signed by the Selectmen. It does not appear whether any articles of clothing and provi- sions were furnished or not. The records of this year are much less correct and elegant than those of the preceding; some of them having been omitted at the time and entered after some years in a different place.
1779. The annual town meeting at J. Stackpole's house in March of this year, like that of the last, exhibits signs of dissatisfaction and division among the inhabitants; but wheth- er arising from personal, interested, or political motives, it is now difficult to ascertain. After electing the usual officers, the meeting was adjourned to a subsequent day, at which time I. Tolman resigned his several offices of moderator, selectman, and treasurer, and N. Crocket that of selectman ; when it was voted to reconsider the choice of P. Porterfield the third selectman also. An entire new board was then chosen, as seen in Table V; and I. Tolman, Samuel Brown, and Wm. Heard, a committee of safety. Wmn. Thompson, John Dillaway, and J. Coombs were chosen surveyors of highways; and the selectmen, in April following, assigned them their several districts as follows ; viz. : to Dillaway, "all
* Original in possession of Messrs. A. W. & E. Brown.
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
the roads from the town line at Warren eastward to the old saw-mill and from thence southward to the dwellinghouse of Oliver Robbins inclusive;" to Coombs, "all the roads to the southward of O. Robbins's house;" and to Thompson, "all the roads from the old saw-mill, northward to the town line at Camden." Dillaway was a cooper from Boston, employed by Wheaton in making lime hogsheads, and now married to the widow of J. Shibles, The committee appointed in 1777 to lay out the roads, reported that "we have laid out the the roads in the following manner, to wit: Beginning at the town line at Warren, (where the Cart Way, as it is now trod, is the middle of the road,) thence running Southeasterly and Easterly by marked Trees, Stumps, Stakes, &c., to the old Saw-mill; and from thence Northeasterly by marked Trees, Stakes, &c., to the town line at Camden. And also from the said old Saw Mill Southerly and Southeasterly by marked Trees, Stumps, Stakes, &c., to the Head of a Cove being part of the River or Pond at Wesaweskeeg. . . . The Persons respectively through whose Lands the said Roads are drawn, we expect voluntarily give the same without any Expence or Charge to the town, Provided that others, through whose lands it may be necessary in future to carry Roads, shall do the like. The roads are four rods wide." Signed by " Mason Wheaton, John Mathews, Jonathan Crockit." The town voted to accept this report and establish the roads as described, except near the o'd saw-mill; where an altera- tion was voted, so as to "run over the bridge where it now is; unless some Person shall appear to make a foundation for a bridge at his own Expence in the other way." These were the first public roads established in the place; though there is no doubt but that they had been previously used, as such, by passengers on foot and horseback, and, in many parts at least, by sleds and carts : wagons, sleighs, and light carriages, not having been yet introduced. From the fact that no road was at this time laid out down the river to the present St. George, we infer that the settlers there, living near the river, still made use of that as their highway, as was the general custom in earlier times.
The subject of schools was first brought before the town by an article inserted in the warrant for this meeting; but nothing was done except a vote to raise £100 in addition to the £100 voted the preceding year " for the maintenance and support of the Ministry, Schools, the Poor, and other neces- sary charges." No assessment of this sum, however, was made this year any more than of the last, probably on ac-
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
count of the declining value of paper money and the distur- bance occasioned by the military operations going on in this part of the country. The assessors' pay was this year fixed at 30s. per day ; though it does not appear that they had any business to perform. as the records show no vote for raising . anything for the repair of roads.
At a meeting, May 19th, on the article to see " if the town will choose a person to represent them in the Great and Gen- eral Court," it was decided in the negative ; and the question whether the town would unite with Waldoboro' and Warren (or either of them) in sending a representative, was also negatived. As representation under the old charter was con- sidered a right belonging to the corporation as such, each town was obliged to pay its own representative ; and the de- sire to avoid this expense without doubt influenced this vote, as it generally did in small and distant towns. On the ques- tion this year submitted to the people of this State, " whether they choose to have a new constitution or form of govern- ment made at this time," the vote here stood, yeas, none; nays, ten. And on the question whether "to impower the next year's representative to vote for calling a State conven- tion to form a new constitution," that also was decided in the same manner and probably for the same reason - the fear of increasing expenditures in the midst of the distresses of the war.
A vote was passed for paying Samuel Tolman £45 for his service in the army ; but the fourth article in the warrant " to see what the general mind of the town is, concerning the Money that was raised by Subscription, for hiring John Carl- ton and John Thompson to go into the Army, and to act further thereon," appears, so far as the records show, to have been passed over without notice. These were the two men apportioned to this town by a resolve of the General Court, June 8th ; and their pay was probably made up by voluntary contributions.
Besides these two men, other recruits from here were ob- tained by voluntary enlistment, particularly for the naval ser- vice, as may be seen by the following hastily written letter from the gallant but somewhat rough and eccentric Commo- dore Tucker. "To Mr. Samuel Gragg at St. George. Boston. Feb. 27th, 1779. Mr. Gragg, Sir, I am very glad you have got some hands and should be very glad if you would make as great Dispatch as possible in getting what you can, and what Expences your are at make a Charge and the Navy Board will settlet with you as to Necessary expence you
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
are at. I would have [you] make all Possible Dispatch that lies in your power for I shall sail in ten days from this Date.
" Yours, . Saml. Tucker."*
But the famous Biguyduce expedition undertaken by Mas- cachusetts in concurronco with Congress for the dislodgement of the British from that place, now Castine, which had been taken possession of June 12th preceding, was the greatest cause of excitement during the year, and, like the Bull Run defeat of the same month of July eighty-two years later, filled with dismay many a patriotic breast. Of Capt. Philip M. Ulmer's company in Col. McCobb's regiment, formed of drafts from this and the neighboring places between Waldo- boro' and Penobscot Bay, John Mathews, 1st Lieutenant, Joseph Coombs, Ist sergeant, Matthew Watson, corporal, Jonathan Crockett, John Miller, Chas. Jameson, John Black- ington, Ephraim Snow, Richard Keating, Ichabod Barrows, Jacob Keen, Joseph Ingraham, and James Heard, privates, were of this town. Many vessels along the coast were pressed into this service as transports, and among them, as we judge from entries in his account-book, was the sloop of Capt. James Watson, who makes the following note: "July 28, 1779, Landed at Bagaduce in the morning as the Sun Rose." Of this well concerted but ill conducted expedition, it is not to our purpose, nor have we space, to give the de- tails. Suffice it to say that Capt. U'lmer's company was among the first to ascend, in the face of an opposing body of troops above them, the bank where they landed, (so steep that it could only be surmounted in broken ranks by clinging, each man as he could, to the bushes,) and, forming anew as they reached the summit and were joined by the rest, speedily drove the enemy to the fort, which, as was thought, might have been easily taken by storm. But, by an unfortunate ad- herence to military etiquette and a criminal disagreement be- tween the naval and military commanders, a delay ensued till a British fleet arrived and compelled our forces to make a precipitate retreat up the Penobscot and home as they best could, most of the vessels being taken or burnt. The soldiers from here all returned in safety, having been absent, or at least under pay, according to the muster-roll, from July 8th to Sept. 24th.
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