USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Bristol > History of York, Maine, successively known as Bristol (1632), Agamenticus (1641), Gorgeana (1642), and York (1652) Vol. I > Part 7
USA > Maine > York County > York > History of York, Maine, successively known as Bristol (1632), Agamenticus (1641), Gorgeana (1642), and York (1652) Vol. I > Part 7
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
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
Thus passed out of existence, and soon out of memory, the last relic of a feudal establishment which Gorges ex- pected to transplant and to flourish in a new world. He was, at heart, a beneficent lord who hoped to rule over his tenants as their friend and patron, but he was putting old wine in new bottles, contrary to scriptural injunctions.
1 A valued friend of early manhood, the late William Mitchell Sargent, lawyer and antiquary of Portland, Maine, whose premature death in 1888 deprived his native state of a zealous and learned historical student, fell into an error regarding the location of the Manor House of Gorges. In a published article (Maine Recorder) he placed it on Swetts Point, the residence of a client whose land title he was then examining. Despite the many references to the location of the house on Gorges Point, the remains of the cellar and the accepted local tradition, he relied on the language of a deed from Thomas Gorges to the Mayor and Corporation of Gorgeana, July 18, 1643 (iv, 46), to support his statements. When this deed is interpreted in connection with subse- quent deeds, and properly examined topographically it disproves rather than supports his theory. This note is added to dispose of it. Were he living, with the new evidence now available, he would acknowledge his error of identification of the situation of the Gorges Manor House.
66
(E
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ARTHUR
IT111679.
CAME.
TO
SAM!
CAME VII-155.
EDW. RISKWORTH 1641.
74 ACRES. 1-106. IV.28.
WILLIAM' ( DIXON.
aUNAT. MASTERSON. 1610.
NATH .: MASTERSON
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1670.
BRACOON
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1702,VII-73.
MATTHEW AUSTN, 1661. 1-106-7
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JOHN BRACY. 1653.
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JERE. MOULTON, , 1684.
JOHN SAYWARD, 1682, EDV. RISHWORTH 165%. 10-50.
T.C. APR.1º, 1652. 1658.
THOMAS HAYNES
JOSEPH MOULTON, 1708. PRO. OFFICE 4-122.
JOHN PEARSE 1653.
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ROBERT YOUNG. 1687. VI-24.
DW:
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1654, X11-215
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ROBERT YOUNG. 1680. VI-26.
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JOHN BRABBURY. 1725. X+190.
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ROWLAND YOUNG.
1673, 111-25.
LINN. 1644
RAFTONS
HENRY LINN.
MARGARET ADAMS 1703. T.A.1-220 MATTHEWS YOUNG. 1720.TR. 1 -376.
1644.
1X1177.
ROWLANO YOUNG.1672 T.R.1-225.
MATTHEWS YOUNG.
JONATHAN YOUNG 1715-X-165.
PRO OFFICE, 8-92.
JOSIAH MAIN.
1705-X1-38.
HENRY SAYWARD.1665. 370 Acres. JI-165.11-148. 1710. VII :- 179. VIII .- 20). 1717.
MAP OF GORGES AND FERRY NECKS Showing Locations of the Earliest Settlers
67
JOHN LEEDS. FREETHY 111-10 5.
REEK.
JAS. GRANT.
1-130.
BARTHOLMEW BARMARD. ROBERT KNIGHT. 1641-1-31. HOS. TRAFTON. 1678-111-30.
AGAMENTICUS
R CO HENRY
THE LOW
Fre
ERRY.
RIVER .
THOMAS BEESON.
EDW: RISHWORTH. 1687. VIM-129-30. JOSIAH MAINE, 1715, YMI-130. 1708, V11-148.
CAPT. THOS. CLARK.ET ALS. OX PASTURE. 1658. 1703 -VII-9.
Mill
1710
Fall
JOHN SAYWARD.
ANES DIXON TO OHN BRAWN. AMES FREETH 1684. 1V-30
96-x1
ABRA. PREBLE, 1652. 1)-179. BENJ. PREBLE. -JED. PREBLE.
BRACY 1701.
ACQUIRED BY JERE MOULTON.
JAMES PLAISTED. 1695. VIII- 189.
BASS COVE CREEKS
SAMSON ANGIERTO JAMESGRANT. 1453-1678 JOHN PEARSE 1653.
JOHN PUDDINGTON 1653.
W !. GARNESEY 1453. ACQUIRED BYMOULTON.
HUCH, GAYLE 1652. HENRY SAYWARD, 1658.
SIR FERDINANDO GORGES. ACQUIRED BY
P.
JEREMIAH MOULTON. 1604. VI-27.
"Mayor of Pe. Christian"
· GORGES CREEK"
VII-39.
1685-VII-84.
ISAYWARD.
.2991
JOHN FREATHY.
JOHN SMYTH. 1696 11.32 RICH. BULGER. THOS.VENNER. E DW. START. RICE HO- WELL.
RICHARD BURGESS EDW: START. 1673. 11-148. MI-25.
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THE MANOR OF POINT CHRISTIAN
The manorial system was not destined to flourish in New England, and with the exception of one on Martha's Vine- yard, created in 1671, the Manor of Point Christian was the only instance where it was in operation in this section. It was against the spirit of the age, as well as opposed by the colonists who had come over to escape the slavery of lifelong tenancy. The little house on Gorge's Neck, a pathetic object when compared with its counterpart in his own country, became the last symbol of his lifelong efforts to extend the empire of his sovereign.
The woodman in the forest hews the Kingly mast to rear, And forth the fearless vessel goes to earth's remotest sphere; But who of all the mariners upon the watery plain
Gives praise to that unswerving Knight who loved the hills of Maine? Lydia Huntley Sigourney.
67
CHAPTER VII THE CHARACTER AND PURPOSES OF THE YORK COLONISTS
That the sociological elements of the settlement at York were as distinctive in origin and quality as compared to the peculiarly theocratic colonies to the south in the Massachusetts Bay - Plymouth and Connecticut - will be evident from an examination of the sources and char- acter of the pioneers who first cast their lot on the pleasant banks of the tidal river of Agamenticus. When the seven- teenth century opened, the adventurous seamen of the West Country had already traversed the Atlantic to the shores of the New-Found-Land, and had conceived and executed those marvellous voyages of discovery of our coast of which the people of East Anglia had neither inter- est, part nor knowledge. Bristol had sent forth the Cabots a century before, Plymouth had also sped Raleigh forth to Virginia, and a continuous succession of the sea-dogs of Devon, Somerset and Gloucestershire had turned the prows of their frail shallops towards the setting sun in search of the Northwest Passage to Cathay. The borough records of Plymouth and Bristol teem with yearly evi- dences of voyages of these bold mariners in their determi- nation to learn more of the unknown world, then a month's sail distant under the most favorable conditions of naviga- tion. It was the country of Raleigh, Drake, Pring, Gilbert, Popham, and Weymouth, and they would not be denied their quarry.
The counties on the North Sea littoral were busy in other forms of activity. In them the religious controversies of the age found fertile soil and East Anglia became the nursery and hothouse of the Puritan movement. While the Spanish Armada was being driven from English shores by the magnificent seamanship of Devon sailors, the popu- lation of Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex was expending its energies in sapping and mining the founda- tions of the Established Church, building on its shattered shrines the crude and curious Puritan type of negation and intolerance. The seamen of Devon were discovering .and
68
THE CHARACTER AND PURPOSES
annexing to the kingdom of Britain the vast unknown continent of North America, while the fustian weavers and chapmen of East Anglia were busily engaged in discussing the wearing of surplices or theological taradiddles.
The pioneers of Maine did not come here to convert the heathen, reform their own church or to interfere with the methods and millinery of worship accepted by others. That annoyance was imposed on them by the later comers from a different section of England who had no part in the discovery and settlement of the Maine coast. East Anglia was dissenting and disloyal, the West Country faithful to the king and the church. East Anglia gave us the intolerant and intolerable Winthrop, Wilson, Cotton, Bradford, the Pilgrims and the Puritans. Devon, Corn- wall and Somerset gave us this New World and charted it for settlement. The Puritans finally overran its soil, thus acquired by a hundred voyagers of the loyal West.
In this West Country was our town conceived in the broad vision of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, and his dream was executed almost exclusively by men of that section. With the religious whimsies of the period he had no sympathy, and doubtless no respect, and the men of affairs with whom he chose to be associated and those he chose as his own partners in the plans he formulated for beginning a new English empire overseas, knew nothing and cared less for the theological dogmas which fed the contentious minds of the yeomen in East Anglia. As the leading, if not the controlling, mind of the Council for New England established at Plymouth, he selected men of his own standards and ideals in the far-reaching plans he had developed for securing this part of America to the Crown by colonization, as his own kind of an earlier generation had claimed it by virtue of discovery. His ideas were imperial, so he gathered round him men of the West Country, from the hardy amphibious stock of Devon, Cornwall and Somerset gentry to carry on and complete his task, with whom he joined a few others of the same social and political quality from other sections of England, prin- cipally London residents, who were not tainted with the leaven of Puritanism.
His great field of endeavor, the Province of Maine, of which he was the Lord Proprietor, with almost vice-regal authority, had for its active participants either as settlers,
69
HISTORY OF YORK
or sharing its management, only men of the landed gentry class. Frankly, it was to be exploited as a plain business enterprise in which religion had no more part than its normal division of responsibility is to be found in every well ordered civilized state. While religion was not em- phasized as the chief object, as in the Massachusetts colo- nies and Connecticut, yet it was not ignored as a necessary factor in the plans of Gorges. He saw to it that clergymen were supplied for the religious needs of his colony, but he picked out educated and ordained ministers of the Eng- lish Church who had not flung the prayerbook of their fathers into the discard, nor substituted for it a cold storage type of worship which gradually froze all the religion out of Puritanism before two centuries had elapsed.
In this work of colonizing Maine he had the support of Sir Thomas Josselyn and his sons Henry and John, Arthur Champernowne, Esq., Mr. Thomas Bradbury, Mr. Ed- ward Godfrey, Capt. Richard Bonython, Mr. Thomas Lewis, Col. Walter Norton, Mr. Henry Norton, Mr. Alex- ander Shapleigh, Capt. Francis Raynes, Mr. Robert Trelawney, Capt. Thomas Cammock, all of whom were active in the settlement and all of them belonging to the armigerous gentry of England, loyal to their king and faithful to the church. With them were associated leaders in mercantile and professional life like Mr. Samuel Maverick, Rev. Robert Jordan, Mr. Humphrey Hooke and Mr. Edward Johnson, all of whom had the tactical misfortune (if it be so classed) to abhor Puritanism and everything it stood for. They became the victims of its intolerance while living, but historically they are now re- garded as the heralds of freedom of thought, speech and worship, which the Puritans fasely proclaimed was their object in emigrating to secure - for themselves only. York was essentially a Royalist settlement.
As the first settlement in this Province of Maine this town was the prime favorite of Gorges in his schemes of Colonial development, and identified with him in its incep- tion were Godfrey, Bradbury, Norton, Maverick, Raynes and Hooke, all of whom had personal and material inter- ests in its success. They encouraged men of substantial character in the West Country to cast their lot in this new settlement and went about the affair in an orderly and businesslike manner. They had no time to spend in hunt-
70
THE CHARACTER AND PURPOSES
ing heretics, nor in whipping, fining, mutilating or brand- ing people who differed from them in matters of theology. They were too busy transforming an impenetrable forest into fertile farms and laying foundations for future trading centers to bother about "justification by faith " or "salva- tion by works"; and so following the lead of Rhode Island they early declared for liberty of conscience and freedom of worship. It is well to understand this now in order to appreciate what disaster it brought on them later through this liberal attitude towards religion as compared to the "freedom" which the Massachusetts theocracy pretended was their object in leaving England to seek greater liberty in these parts. Both Rhode Island and Maine felt the lash of these religious tyrants in the bitter years that followed the certain establishment of the "Lord's Brethren" in the security of authority on the shores of Massachusetts Bay. Instead of leaving behind them the traditions or manners and customs of life in Merrie England the settlers of Maine brought them to the virgin shores of York as will be seen in the progress of this narrative, and here continued to live their old lives as sane Englishmen of their fathers' day had done in their former home.
It has seemed necessary to lay special emphasis on the original social and religious distinctions which differen- tiated the colonists of Maine and Massachusetts from the beginning as the differences were fundamental. They represented, to a certain degree, the line of demarcation between the contending philosophies of government which were to clash in the disastrous Civil War. It was a local rivalry between Royalists and Roundheads, and if there were no clashing of arms it was, none the less, a real con- test of supremacy on the part of the representatives of the principal opponents in England. The progress of each side ran parallel with the victories and defeats of their English overlords. It is important to understand this situation in order to properly appraise the motives and acts of each of the opposing parties as they developed in the course of the history of this town. The Royalists of Maine were gen- erally satisfied with the existing order and with their rela- tions to the Proprietary. The Massachusetts settlers were rebels against the king and the church and they wished to overthrow both. It was an inevitable conflict to which there could be no compromise. The result of these local
71
HISTORY OF YORK
skirmishes and plays for advantage finally led to the defeat of the king's supporters and with it went some of the last relics of the divine right of kings in the English colonies of America. For these no regret is summoned. It was the be- ginning of a new order of political philosophy and the people of York were deeply loyal to the throne and the pro- prietor while they remained the legal authority in the province. It was inbred in their lives. Their consistency in this respect engages our sympathy for their adherence to law and order as it was acceptably administered by the Lord Proprietor and his local representatives. They had no reason to seek the arbitrament of arms nor become traitors to their sovereign. They were a peaceful, law- abiding community.
72
CHAPTER VIII AGAMENTICUS CALLED BRISTOL
The old walled town of Bristol, on the Avon, with its inland "har- bor," made a city in 1542, has an earlier and more impor- tant connection = with this country than any other sea- port of Eng- land. London merchants did not figure in the development of the new conti- nent for more than a century after Bristol THE ANCIENT ARMS OF BRISTOL, ENGLAND Granted in 1569 Reproduced by courtesy of the Corporation of Bristol had sent the Cabots to go in search of countries, "heretofore unknown to all Christians." The metropolis of the West of England has been aptly called "The Birthplace of America" by Miss Nora Dermott Harding, the present City Archivist, and as will be man- ifest from the story of the connection of its enterprising citizens, it can be easily established that it was the foster mother of York. .
For a number of years before and after 1630 merchants of Bristol had been interested in land speculation in Maine and had obtained patents of territory which were being actively exploited. The Pemaquid Patent granted to Thomas Aldworth and Giles Elbridge, rich merchants of
73
HISTORY OF YORK
Bristol, was witnessed by young William Hooke of that city on February 29, 1631-2 in Bristol, and on May 27, 1633, having made the voyage across the Atlantic, he was a further witness to the delivery of the property to the agents of the patentees. In view of what happened later it is certain that Hooke in this first visit to the coast came
WINE STREET, BRISTOL, 1600
Reproduced from an old print in "Bristol Past and Present" (J. W. Arrowsmith, Ltd.), by courtesy of the Publishers.
to Agamenticus to see the infant settlement of which he must have known some particulars in Bristol when Colonel Norton was obtaining his patent the previous year.
From fragmentary evidence in the manuscript col- lections of the British Museum there is some reason to believe that Godfrey went to England soon after the sad blow to the infant settlement of Agamenticus which took away the chief patentee, Walter Norton, and his own nearest kinsman, young John Godfrey, murdered by the Indians, as it was necessary to explain the situation to the surviving partners as well as to his bereaved brother con- cerning the loss of his only son. About this time his father-in-law died and the two events undoubtedly de- manded this visit to England for official as well as family reasons. It is not unlikely that young Hooke returned
74
.
AGAMENTICUS CALLED BRISTOL
with him. The fruits of this visit are not documented, but the early appearance of new settlers at Agamenticus gives evidence that he had interested others in the work left unfinished by the dead soldier. Doubtless in his confer- ences with Sir Ferdinando, the old knight was advised to establish his own official residence in Agamenticus and make it the metropolitan of the province as both actions followed soon after.' In addition the need of sawmills to enable settlers to erect permanent and substantially fur- nished houses was presented with such urgency that in a short time artisans of the building trades were sent across to construct mills on the tidal stream on the Gorges side of the river, as will be explained in full detail in a special chapter.
It is now easy to account for the inception of interest in this plantation which led Humphrey Hooke, a very rich merchant, alderman and mayor of Bristol, to begin his adventures in Agamenticus. With its leading settler to give him personal testimony in corroboration of the opin- ions of Gorges as to the commercial prospects of the newly settled coast of Maine and possibly the additional views of William Hooke, we can date his important association with it. Humphrey Hooke was a native of Chichester, Sussex, born in 1582, a scion of the Hookes of Bramshot, and as a young man had gone to Bristol, then the great seaport of western England, second only to London in maritime importance. It was the port most frequently used by the Maine colonists in their business relations with the mother country and, as is known, the residence of
Hans thookey maior
SIGNATURE OF HUMPHREY HOOKE From Common Council Proceedings, Bristol (1642-8) 04264(4) (Copyright, Courtesy of the Corporation of Bristol, England.)
Gorges. Youths from all parts of England went there to begin a mercantile career and young Hooke was admitted a burgess of Bristol February 10, 1606, "for that he hath marryed Cicely the daughter of Thomas Young, mer- chant" (Mayors Audits Accounts, Bristol). His rise in public and business affairs in the city began early and
75
HISTORY OF YORK
became rapid and spectacular. He was early interested in the New World. In 1610 he became one of the patentees of New Foundland, when only twenty-eight; in 1614 he was elected sheriff; treasurer of the Merchant Venturers Company in 1616; and seven times its master after 1621. In 1629 he became mayor of Bristol, and the next year one of his ships, the Eagle, sailing under a Letter of Marque against the Spanish and French, brought him in prizes to the value of forty thousand pounds, the greatest financial reward of this sort ever known at this period. Counted in present-day values it represented about two million dollars. When Godfrey met him he was probably the richest merchant in Bristol. Mayor Hooke was a resident of the parish of St. Stephens, near the docks of the city, living in a large mansion on the Wood Quay fac- ing the Bowling Green. Here fourteen children were born to him 1608-1629 of whom the second son and fourth child, William, baptized 8 April 1612, was the young gentleman who had already visited Agamenticus as just related, in his twenty-second year. Probably in honor of Mayor Hooke and his son William the little plantation on the Agamenticus was now called Bristol.
That Godfrey brought back with him a charter, now lost, having powers of government, is clearly evident from casual references to a corporate organization established here prior to the first Agamenticus Patent of 1641 and even the patent of 1638. This may have incorporated the settlement as Bristol (Winthrop Journal ii, 8), a name by which it was early known. The provincial records of Maine (1640) speak of several patents which had been granted to the inhabitants and ordered "that the Government now established in. Agamenticus shall soe remaine" (i, 55). We have seen that in 1636 "the officer of Accamenticus" is mentioned in the same records, indicating the existence of an organized political corporation. As the Hilton settle- ment on the Piscataqua was already called Bristol, through purchase by merchants of the west of England, it is prob- able that to avoid confusion another patent was issued in the name of Accamenticus as on March 13, 1637-8 William Hooke was called "now Governor of Accamenti- cu's," and in 1640 he signs as "Governor" (Deeds vi, 74, 150).
Godfrey's return can be placed in 1634 and for the fol-
76
AGÁMENTICUS CALLED BRISTOL
lowing three years the settlement grew in numbers, in advantages as a residence for emigrants, and in commer- cial and political importance. Apparently, however, the Lord Proprietor, now in his sixty-seventh year and caught in his declining days in the approaching maelstrom of the Civil War, on the losing side politically, was not moving fast enough to suit the energetic pioneers on the spot. The disturbances in England, social and religious, following the successes of the Puritan movement, were reflected in Mas- sachusetts and Maine. The leaders of the Bay Colony were zealously persecuting and officially plundering those who sympathized with the king, while in Maine it was the opportunity for every demagogue to take advantage of the situation and become "Puritan" as a stroke of policy. Of this latter class George Cleeves of Casco Bay was the chief malefactor, "one of the arrantest knaves in New Eng- land," according to Governor Winslow of Plymouth. His actions against the peaceable loyalists of Maine were merely to advance his own personal fortunes, but the relentless hounding of the loyalists in Massachusetts was a fundamental campaign of Puritan fanaticism which re- sulted in constant and repeated complaints by the victims to the king's advisers of these crying injustices. It grew to such proportions by 1637 that the Attorney General, in an attempt to curb these religious tyrants, brought a writ of Quo Warranto to vacate the charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Cleeves, who had gone to England in 1636 to stir up what trouble he could, "procured a writ out of the Star Chamber Office to command Mr. Edward Godfrey, Mr. John Winter, Mr. (Thomas) Purchase and Richard Vines to apear at the Counsell table to answear some sup- posed wrongs." Vines wrote that Godfrey "went over to answeare for himself Mr. Winter and my selfe." (4 Mass. Hist. Coll. vii.) This voyage undertaken by Godfrey had another and a more important object. His stay in Eng- land was prolonged for a year or more, and while there, in April 1638, he was present at the first Quo Warranto trial of the Massachusetts Bay Patent. The representatives of the patentees were "called upon to confront a peremptory demand from the Lords Commissioners in England for the surrender of the Massachusetts charter, coupled with a threat of sending over a new Governor General from Eng- land." It was an anxious and serious time for the Boston
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