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 18
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 18
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 18
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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
Other parts of the town also received some additional set- tlers during these unsettled times. Nathaniel Woodcock, who had married a sister of the Healeys, came from Attle- boro' to the Oyster River neighborhood, purchased one-half of the John Alexander lot, where he built and resided the re- mainder of his life. Joshua and Robert Thorndike, with their newly married wives, came from Cape Elizabeth and settled near each other, the former in St. George, the latter in South Thomaston, on the tract which their father had taken up thirty years before, and whose garden, with its cher- ries, plums, and currants, they found still remaining. For some years after their coming, wild animals yet abounded. On one occasion, the elder of these brothers, when going to George's, (as what is now Thomaston was still called, ) in crossing the neck between Wessaweskeag and Mill Rivers, encountered a bear which from her behavior he supposed had cubs, and, not being disposed to yield the right of way, de- fended himself with such weapons as the forest afforded, and succeeded in driving her up a large tree. Not willing to
* Sibley's History of Union, Mrs. P. Willis, family traditions, &c.
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
leave her there to molest others, he stripped off his jacket and tied it by the sleeves about the tree, thinking it might frighten and keep the bear up till he could run down to Capt. Lovett's and borrow a gun. On his return, however, he found the bear was not to be daunted by an empty jacket, and was now nowhere to be found. There was then no road but a pathway with marked trees through the woods ; and the passage to the present Thomaston was usually made by water as far as Oak Point, near the head of Wessaweskeag pond on the western side, and thence through the woods to Mill River. These two brothers had both heen soldiers in the war which was still afflicting the country. Joshua enlisted immediately. after the battle of Bunker Hill, at first for six months and then for three years, joining the army at Cambridge. Subsequently engaging on board a privateer fitted out at Falmouth, he was soon captured by the British sloop-of-war Albany, and de- tained in irons on board her, nine months. It was one of the gratifying incidents of his life that this ship, in which he had suffered so much, was, during the cessation of hostilities that preceded the termination of the war, driven in a winter snow-storm upon the Triangles, a ledge lying between the Muscle Ridges and Green Island; and so badly injured that the crew were saved only by chartering a craft of Capt. F. Haskell at Ash Point who carried them to Biguyduce. After having been visited by Thorndike and Elwell in one boat and Isaac Orbeton in another, for such articles of value as they could bring away, the detested craft went to pieces ; but un- fortunately causing the death of two persons, by name Adams and Springer, who had visited her from some of the neighbor- ing places for the same purpose in a third boat. All her can- non went down, through her broken bottom, on to the rocks ; where at low tide many of them were long afterwards to be seen, wedged fast among the clefts, and might perhaps even now be recovered. The father of these. Ebenezer Thorndike of Cape Elizabeth previously mentioned, had continued to re- tain his possession of the island of Matinic; the northern half of which he gave to his son Joshua, on condition of his residing there and taking charge of the whole together with the cattle and sheep with which it was then well stocked. This the latter did; living there six months. In that time he was robbed by tory or British marauders in shaving-mills, three times; having, among other losses, his sheep shot down, his tea-kettle (then a rather rare and costly article) taken from the fire and smashed, his beds ripped open, and the feathers scattered to the winds. Wearied by these vexations,
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he finally abandoned the island as a place of residence, but not as a possession, and settled as before noted ; having while on the island, from motives of humanity and the exigencies of the case, once successfully officiated at the birth of a child to the saving of two lives, - a matter he used to recall and relate with greater exultation than any of his other exploits."
1781. Some additional settlers continued to arrive. Job, Joseph, and Josiah Ingraham took up three adjoining lots of unimproved land bordering on the sea in the eastern part of the town, near the present boundary of Rockland and South Thomaston. They were brothers, and natives of Cape Ann. Job was here prior to the town's incorporation, but, being then taxed for his poll only, was probably a new-comer and unlocated. Joseph may have been here also, but soon en- listed and served three or more years in the army. He re- turned, however, and in 1781 settled here with his brothers. Their lots were selected with an eye to their future maritime and commercial advantages ; which they were not slow to realize, all of them becoming men of wealth and influence. Job was one of the first converts under the preaching of El- der Case in 1786, and sustained the office of deacon in the Baptist church. Joseph was a justice of the peace for more than half a century, solemnizing 160 marriages, presiding in 250 criminal trials, and rendering judgment in 3116 civil actions ; was thirteen times chosen town clerk, and frequently filled other town offices. Josiah was engaged in commerce and navigation all the early and more active part of his life. The schooner Dolphin, the first vessel ever built in his imme- diate part of the town, was the result of his enterprise and energy ; and, if we may credit a family tradition, he after- wards made, during a temporary interruption of our trade with the West Indies, several successful voyages to the East Indies. Richard Sayward, with his wife, also came from Cape Ann or Gloucester a year or two later and settled on the Georges river side, now South Thomaston, on the third lot from the line of St. George. Capt. Thomas Hix about this time, also, settled near the Head of Owl's Head Bay. He was a native of Cape Elizabeth, his father having, while an apprentice boy in England, to avoid a flogging for the loss of a cask of liquor which he had carelessly left running, fled from his master, obtained a passage to America, and after- wards married and settled in Cape Elizabeth. John Godding came from Mansfield, Mass., to one of the Fox Islands, and
* Traditions in the Thorndike family.
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
thence, during the Revolutionary troubles there, to this place ; settling on a lot north of the Ingrahams, some time between 1777 and the present year .*
Onerous as the burdens of the last year were to this town, their weight was greatly augmented by the fact that not only the taxes voted by the town, but its proportion of the State taxes for 1778 and 1779, remained to be assessed and called for before the close of the political year. Accordingly, in February, 1781, £494, 8s. 8d. of State tax No. 1; £2465, 2s. Od. of No. 2; £2076, 13s. 6d. of No. 3; all for 1779; also £123, 12s. 2d. of State tax No. 1; and £123, 13s. 2d. of No. 2, 1778; - were assessed and committed to the con- stable for collection. In January a meeting of the inhabitants was called to take their burdens into consideration ; and, after referring the subject to a committee, passed the follow- ing resolution ; " that we are not able at present to pay the Tax now laid upon us; and therefore we think proper to ac- quaint the Court of our inability." Nor was Thomaston the only town which complained of the burdens thus thickening upon her. The entire county of Lincoln, whose share of the first beef tax was 66090 lbs., and of the second 129152 lbs., seems to have alike regarded the burden as insupportable ; and a convention of delegates from its several towns was called to meet at the dwellinghouse of Eben Whittier at Wis- casset Point, Feb. 14th, to petition the General Court for a redress of grievances. At a meeting called to consider the subject, the town, probably deterred by a fear of expense, voted not to send a delegate, but to choose a committee, viz., Robert Jameson and Jeremiah Tolman, "to meet with the town of Warren and Plantation called the lower Town of St. George's to consult on proper Methods to obtain a Redress of Grievances." We are not informed what action followed, but believe it was ultimately successful, and a material abate- ment of the taxes was obtained. At any rate, 1409 lbs. only of beef were apportioned to Thomaston, June 22, 1781, with three blankets, and of shoes, stockings, and shirts six pairs each.t
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It is not improbable that all minor and pecuniary embar- rassments were soon lost sight of in a more alarming and dis- couraging event which immediately succeeded. Gen. Wads- worth, having in the preceding December dismissed the troops
* Mrs. M. R. Ludwig; Capt. I. J. Hix; G. Lindsay, Esq ; obituary notices, &c.
t Massachusetts Records.
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
which he had called out in the spring, was left at his head- quarters in this town with a small body-guard of three men . only ; - soldiers from the neighboring militia being occasion- ally called for to act as sentinels. His situation being made known to the British commander ai Biguyduce, Lieui. Stock- ton was sent, Feb. 18, 1781, with a party of twenty-five men and Waldo Dicke for a pilot, in a schooner used as a privateer, to attempt his capture. They arrived and anchored in Wes- saweskeag River ; whence, after waiting at the house of Mr. Snow till eleven o'clock at night, they started on their er- rand ; - the distance to Wadsworth's quarters being about four miles. . Proceeding up the Wessaweskeag Pond and Marsh, on the ice and slightly crusted snow, they met on the way Hez- ekiah Bachelder returning from Warren with a bag of meal on his back which he had carried there to get ground. Lest he should spread an alarm, they took him with them a prisoner till they should return, and proceeded on without further adventure to their destination. Crossing the lots and ap- proaching the house in the rear, they were wholly unperceived till almost at the door. Wm. Boggs of Warren who was standing sentinel there, hearing a crackling of the crusted snow, hailed " who comes there ?" but they rushed on before the words were out of his mouth, disarmed him, and as- saulted the house in various quarters. The curious visitor to this relic of antiquity, variously designated the "Seavey house," " the old Castle," but more usually " the Wadsworth house," will perceive that the structure has undergone some material alterations besides the usual ones produced by time and neglect. The house at the time of the capture, as far as we can make it out, was of one story and much smaller on the ground than at present, measuring about 36 feet in length by 27 in width, and containing three rooms only and an entry. The last of these, in the N. W. corner, was entered by a door looking westward toward the present street ; opposite to which an inner door opened eastward into the kitchen. Out of the same entry, to the right of the entrance, a third door opened into the main front or west room, which room had doors also opening into the kitchen and into the bedroom ad- jacent in the S. E. corner of the house. At this time the General and his wife were sleeping in the front room; and their two children with Miss Fenno of Boston, a friend of Mrs. Wadsworth, in the bedroom adjoining. The kitchen was used as a sort of guard-room ; into which, as one of the sentinels opened the door, some of the assailants discharged VOL. I. 14
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
their pieces and entered. At the same moment, others fired into the General's apartment and blew in a part of the win- dow; and a third party forced their way to Miss Fenno's . room. Thus possession was taken of the whole house, ex- cept the General's room, which was strongly barred. Find- ing no person with Miss Fenno except Mrs. Wadsworth, who had fled thither to dress herself, a British officer ordered the firing there to cease. Armed with a brace of pistols, a fusee, and a blunderbuss, the General fought the assailants away entirely from his windows and the kitchen door. Twice he ineffectually snapped his blunderbuss at others whom he heard in the entry; when they retreated. He next seized his fusee, and fired upon those who were breaking through one of his windows; and they. also withdrew. The attack was then renewed through the entry, and was bravely resisted with his bayonet. But the appearance of his under linen be- traying him to the soldiers in the kitchen, they instantly fired at him from the door that opened thither, and one of their bullets went through his left arm. Forced to surrender, they helped him to dress with all expedition, except his coat, which could not be drawn over his fractured arm. His wife and Miss Fenno, in spite of the condition the house was in, doors and windows demolished, one room on fire, and the floors covered with blood, hastily tied a handkerchief on his arm, and threw a blanket over his shoulders; when he was pre- cipitately hurried away. Two wounded British soldiers were placed on the General's horse taken from the barn; and he himself, and a wounded soldier of his, marched on foot, as- sisted by their captors. "When they had proceeded about a mile they met at a small house a number of people who had collected, and who inquired if they had taken Gen. Wads- worth. They said no, and added that they must leave a wounded man in their care, and if they paid proper attention to him they should be compensated, but if not, they would burn down their house."#
This house was undoubtedly that of Dr. David Fales, who received the apparently dying man, extracted the ball from his thigh, kept and took care of him till his recovery, and, it is said, received adequate compensation. It was then probably early morning; and the persons assembled there were, perhaps, the doctor's sons, one of whom, Willard, was preparing wood for a morning fire. Their uncle Atwood, who was also there, seeing the approach of British soldiers and
* Dwight's Travels, in Thatcher's Journal.
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
remembering former courtesies, made his escape by the back door and took shelter in the woods .*
Wadsworth, warned that his safety depended on his silence, was then mounted in place of the wounded man left, and the paily hurried on to Wessaweskeag and snatched a hasty break- fast ready prepared at Snow's. A question then arose, what should be done with Bachelder, whom they had thus far kept as a prisoner. "Take him with you to Biguyduce," said Mr. Snow, "if you don't want the whole neighborhood at your backs." But Bachelder pleaded for his children, suffer- ing for the meal ; and they finally released him on his solemn oath not to utter a word till they were gone out of the river. This oath he was reluctant to take, but the starving condition of his family compelled him. The privateer being found in waiting, the party hurried on board with their prisoners, and returned without molestation to Biguyduce. One of the Gen- eral's body-guard, Hickey by name, was left at the scene of the foray, badly wounded in the thigh; who, as soon as his condition would admit, was taken to Waldoboro' and put un- der ^the care of Dr. Schaeffer, or, as translated, Shepherd. One other was taken off with Wadsworth as before related; the other, John Montgomery, happened to be absent that night at his father's in Warren ; and the three militia men, Boggs, P. Sechrist, and Nat. Copeland, after the capture, being left without orders, returned to the'r homes in that town. The General's children received no injury ; the eldest, a son five years old, having slept undisturbed through the whole affair. That so daring an exploit could have been accomplished, without exciting an alarm among the inhabitants, may seem strange to persons acquainted only with the present condi- tion of the place ; but at that time it was but a lonely, thinly settled, and partially reclaimed wilderness. The nearest house to Wadsworth's quarters, we believe. was the old dilapidated one of Abiathar Smith, near the Prison corner, or Watson's on the point across the river. Patrick Porterfield and Jona- than Lampson lived on the hill near Oyster River, joined, about this time or a little before, by N. Woodcock on the lot . beyond. John Dillaway, who had married the widow Shi- bles, occupied the farm of her late husband, further eastward; and Capt. Jonathan Spear was, probably, at this time on the future Jenks farm. Further on, the house of Dr. Fales be- fore mentioned, where D. Thorpe Fales now resides, and those of Nat. Fales and O. Robbins, both zealous patriots,
* Tradition, Mr. J. Tarbox, &c.
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
were the only other inhabited houses it was necessary to pass in going or returning.
Major Burton, who had been discharged from service but a few days before this capture, was absent when the raid took place ; but now, teeling extremely anxious about his laie com- mander, repaired to his former station at Camden ; and, whilst waiting there in hope of some information respecting his fate, a flag of truce arrived bringing letters from him to Mrs. Wads- worth and Gov. Hancock, both of which he gladly took charge of and forwarded. Subsequently, a passport having been obtained, Burton, in a vessel which he either owned or pro- cured, conducted Mrs. Wadsworth and Miss Fenno to visit the General in his confinement, and, after their stay there of ten days, brought them back and conveyed them to Fal- mouth and Boston. On his return from Boston, the vessel was watched for by the enemy, pursued, and captured not far from Monhegan ; and Burton was made prisoner, carried to Biguyduce, and confined in the same apartment with Wadsworth. Then followed these two officers' celebrated, well-planned, well-executed, and providentially-aided escape ; which, being an oft-told tale, cannot here be given for want of space, though Burton's unpublished narrative of it, left among the papers of the late historian of Maine, now before me,* furnishes some additional particulars of interest. Leav- ing their prison behind them, they pursued their way up the Penobscot, crossing successively that and the Passagassawam- keag river, and took refreshment in the house of Noah Miller, a stanch whig of Lincolnville, but, through fear of some treach- erous tory or soldiers in pursuit, dared not stay over night in the house, but went a mile into the woods and lodged on the ground. Next morning they took their course directly through the woods to Warren, where leaving the General to recruit his strength among the settlers there, and to proceed to Fal- mouth by land, Burton hurried on to his own house in Cush- ing. There, though reluctant to leave a young wife and pleasant home, he dared not tarry but for a single night, from fear of tories, who, since the capture of Wadsworth, had be- come bolder than ever, and some of whom were among his own connections. The next day he set out for Boston. Find- ing no vacancy which he wished to fill in the army, he took a commission as Captain of Marines on board of a 20-gun ship commanded by Capt. Thos. Dinsmore. After cruising a month off Newfoundland, this ship steered for Cape Clear,
* Kindly furnished by Hon. Joseph Williamson of Belfast.
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ROCKLAND AND SOUTH THOMASTON.
Ireland, intending to intercept a fleet of merchantmen from the West Indies. In October, espying four ships to the wind- ward which they took for a part of this fleet, they stood for them, but to their no small disappointment found them to be three British frigates and one sloop-of-war; and, being un- able to escape in the teeth of the gale that was blowing, they were captured, and confined in the castle of Cape Clear till February. They were thence removed to England, and con- fined in the old Dunkirk seventy-four ship; from which the overtures of peace in a few months set them at liberty. In an enemy's land, without money and without friends able to assist him, Major Burton succeeded in getting a passage to L'Orient in France, and thence in the frigate Alliance, Capt. Harden, to New London, Ct. From that place, with only eight shillings in money, he accomplished a journey home of 260 miles, before the end of May. When the privations and perils of war were over, he, with many thousands, returned to the plough, to enjoy, in straitened circumstances, yet with a cheerful spirit, liberties and privileges no less the bounty of Heaven because they were purchased with blood.
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HISTORY OF THOMASTON,
CHAPTER IX.
CLOSE OF THE REVOLUTION, AND PROGRESS OF THE TOWN TO 1790.
HAVING thus followed the fortunes of a distinguished officer and actor in the Revolutionary events of this place, we re- turn to 1781. At the annual meeting in March, the town voted "that the highways be repaired by a Rate the present year,"- a thing the people had refused or neglected to do for the three preceding years, probably preferring to turn out voluntarily, at the call of the surveyor, or to leave their ways unmended till the close of the war. The amount raised was voted in silver currency, to be paid in work at the rate of 6s. a day for a man, and 3s. for a yoke of oxen; a proof that the paper money was so far depreciated and variable as to be no longer serviceable even as a standard of value.
The three recruits for the army assigned to Thomaston in December preceding, not having been otherwise provided for, the selectmen, April 16th, divided the inhabitants into three separate classes, and gave a list of their names to Col. Whea- ton, " being the only commanding Officer known to them." These classes, it seems, neglected to procure the men re- quired; and, Jan. 22, 1782, the sum of £385, 8s. 6d. was assessed upon them as an equivalent, -each deficiency be- ing set at £128, 9s. 6d. This, with the other taxes probably not yet liquidated, gave rise to a town meeting in the same month; when J. Simonton, Capt. N. Fales, and Atwood Fales were chosen a committee to petition the General Court for a redress of grievances; money was furnished by individuals ; and Col. Wheaton forthwith despatched to Boston with a petition which, seconded by his personal influence, it was hoped might be successful. The expense advanced, £12, was subsequently refunded from the town treasury; and in May the town decided to be again represented in the General Court.
Business continued depressed. Coasting was. well nigh annihilated; fishing, except in rivers and harbors, had become too precarious to be much ventured upon; and the only re- sources left to the inhabitants were agriculture and the man- ufacture of salt. This last business was carried on to a con- siderable extent, even as far up George's River as Watson's Point, where, according to the books of Capt. James Watson, 298 bushels were made and sold by him this season. It was
--
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also made to a small extent by Bachelder and other dwellers on the seashore and at Wessaweskeag, and more largely by Coombs, Keating, and others, at the latter place. The un- propitious seasons seem to have continued discouraging to advances in agriculture; - there being a fall of two or three feet of snow, this year, late in April. To add to the misery of the times, depredations by the refugees upon their own countrymen and neighbors still abounded and increased. The British continuing to occupy at Penobscot, and, since the withdrawal of Wadsworth, no permanent force being left here as a check, this petty warfare, as well as illicit traffic, was now, in this vicinity, carried to its greatest height. Injuries, on each side, were complained of and retaliated. Brother was arrayed against brother, neighbor against neighbor. Tories openly engaged in predatory exploits were known to be frequently on shore and lurking in concealment among those who favored the royal cause; so that no one knew when his family and property were free from danger. Messrs. Keating, Coombs, Mathews, Bridges, and Orbeton of Wessa- weskeag, had purchased a small schooner with the proceeds of salt, for the manufacture of which they had carried wood to the salt-works on their own shoulders, and had sent her to Boston under the command of Capt. D. Crouch, with a cargo of that article procured in the same laborious way. On her return, however, with a scanty store of provisions and other necessaries for support of their families, she was captured off Monhegan by the two notorious tories, John Long and Benj. Bradford, accompanied by some Scotchmen from Castine, in a shaving-mill. Thus these men not only lost the proceeds of their hard labor, but had the mortification of finding the cargo, on which they depended for their winter stores, was brought. to their own river and delivered over in payment of a debt, which one of the captors owed to a wealthy neighbor and townsman. This affair was attended with many aggra- vating circumstances, which long rankled in the breasts of the sufferers, and the bitter memory of which nothing but the subsequent power of religion could overcome."
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