USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Waldoboro > History of old Broad Bay and Waldoboro, Volume 1 > Part 16
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In the coming struggle it was to stand to the credit and security of our founding fathers that from their first contact, their treatment of the savages differed markedly from that of the English. To them the Indians were fellow humans, and their dealings with them in the beginning were invariably characterized by kindness, consideration, and justice. This fact did not pass unnoticed and unrecognized in the hearts of the Indians, and it unquestionably put off for a number of years such onslaughts as were visited far earlier on neighboring settlements as the war clouds in Europe darkened. In March 1744 France, by a formal declaration, joined Spain in the war on England. This was the signal for the French in conjunction with their Indian allies to start the Fifth Indian War in New England, which in due time altered markedly the course of life in the settlement at Broad Bay.
IX BROAD BAY GOES TO WAR
Then was war in the gates.
JUDGES V, 8
N THE PRECEDING CHAPTER it was made clear that the discomforts and sufferings of the Germany colony at Broad Bay, in its initial adjustment, did not proceed from a callous and indifferent proprie- tor but rather from a lack of foresight on the part of Waldo and Zuberbühler, and from a train of circumstances over which neither could exercise much control. This impression of the man, Waldo, finds strong confirmation in the fact that there was nothing in the treatment of his settlers on the Georges to lend color to the charges of inhumanness traditionally levelled at him on the Medo- mak. There was in the two settlements a very fundamental dif- ference. The group on the Georges was made up largely of settlers with a long experience in frontier conditions, masters in the know- how of adaptation, familiar with the habits and ways of Indian life; whereas on the Medomak the Germans were totally unskilled and inept in all those modes of living best suited to effect a con- quest of the wilderness. Their almost complete isolation from all sources of aid was another tragic phase of their first experiences. A rough path through the forest connected them with the settle- ment on the Georges eight miles away as the crow flies, and that was all. They were separated from the larger settlements to the south and west by leagues of pathless forests and by unbridged streams and rivers. Their only contact with the outside world was by water, and this avenue was closed by ice from December to April. In short, their woe - and woe there was - had its root in unfriendly circumstances rather than in human indifference.
When all has been said that can be said in justice to Samuel Waldo, the fact remains that from its very beginning an unhappy destiny seems to have marked this little colony on the Medomak for its own. It had left Europe after interminable and costly delays in the midst of the War of the Austrian Succession. From the time of its landing at Broad Bay to the following spring, Nature and untoward circumstances had exacted their toll of misery, suffering,
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
and death. As their local skies brightened in the course of the year 1743, shadows were falling athwart the ocean; for France was growing more menacing in the war between England and Spain; and her ancient allies in New England, the Indians, were stirring and becoming restive. It was thus that the tiny settlement was faced with a new horror that it little understood how to meet; for the Indians had an art of war peculiar to themselves; and woe it was to those who had no understanding of their subtle and savage tactics. The Germans could only learn of defense and Indian war- fare from their English neighbors on the Medomak and at other points in the Waldoborough and Georges areas; but even here, in the matter of this essential service that their neighbors might render, they were hampered by the lack of a common speech.
It was indeed fortunate for Broad Bay that the government in Boston was keenly alert to the danger, and in the person of Governor Shirley had an executive of long Indian experience who was vitally interested in maintaining the inviolability of the eastern settlements and in keeping the settlers in their frontier homes. As early as March 1743, over a year before France actually declared war, we may believe from a letter of Shirley to the Duke of Newcastle (March 19, 1743) that the Governor had raised "ten companies of snow-shoe men" in the frontier parts of the Province.1 These companies consisted of fifty men each and were equipped "with a good gun and ammunition, a hatchet and an extra pair of shoes or moccasins." It was their duty to scout around the fringes of the settled areas and to converge on the shortest warning and take up the pursuit of any party of marauding Indians, "who fre- quently in time of war make sudden Incursions, whilst there is a deep snow upon the ground, and retreat as suddenly into the Woods after having done what mischief they can; in which case it is necessary that the soldiers who go in quest of 'em should make use of snow shoes and Moggasons to travel thro the snow." Addi- tional measures for the defense of the frontier outposts were also taken. At about this time the General Court appropriated the sum of £1280 for putting the eastern forts in a state of defense. This was the first step in a general program to erect a line of blockhouses around the frontier, the forts to be located in such a manner as to provide refuges for the settlers and headquarters for the scouts who were continuously on the march around the frontier to prevent any sudden surprise incursions of the savages. The money appropriated was apportioned to fourteen places and was used for constructing stockades, blockhouses, breastworks, and
1Correspondence of Wm. Shirley, ed. by Charles H. Lincoln (New York: Mac- millan Co., 1912), I, 115.
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walls of hewn timber, and for fortifying the more exposed dwelling houses. In this apportionment in our immediate area Sheepscot received £100; Damariscotta, £67; Pemaquid, £134; Broad Bay, £75; St. Georges River, £100. This sum, though entirely inadequate, provided encouragement and restored confidence on the frontier, and the settlers bestowed upon these works a great amount of labor, and the groundwork at least was laid for attaining a very considerable security at a later date.
This was only the beginning. In early September 1743, Gov- ernor Shirley addressed the General Court as follows: "I shall order an estimate of the whole charge of completing what further remains to be done for finishing the fortifications in the separate parts of the Province ... as shall appear to be necessary ... espe- cially with the present crisis of affairs in Europe."2 On December 15 of the same year the General Court raised "£20,000 for putting the Province in a better posture of defense," and "a committee was fully authorized and empowered to receive the same, and to lay out in the most prudent manner, in erecting in each of the settle- ments, for their security during the war, a garrison or garrisons of stockades or square timber around some Dwelling-house or houses, or otherwise as will be most for the security of the whole In- habitants of each place."3 The older histories are one in stating that nothing was done to provide protection at Broad Bay. This was in no sense the case, for there was activity along such lines in 1743, and by 1744 Samuel Waldo had charge of the province troops on the frontier and the chief direction there in building "a number of forts in order to prevent the incursions of the French and their Indians."4
This show of defense impressed the neighboring Indians, and as France had not yet declared war the year 1743 passed with no molestation of the settlers on the part of the savages. The Ger- mans at Broad Bay were, under their contract with Mr. Waldo, provided throughout the summer up to October with their food requirements and were able to reserve large quantities of their salt meat for winter use, since the land and tide areas along with their own crops supplied them entirely with needed nourishment. In consequence the winter of 1743-1744 was a period of reasonable security against hunger, cold, and the attack of the savages. The weather, too, was most favorable. Parson Smith in his Journal found no grounds for comment on unusual weather conditions through January, February, and March of 1744. His first observa- tion is on April 29, when his comments began to run as follows:
2Boston News Letter, Sept. 15, 1743.
$Boston News Letter.
4The Case for Samuel Waldo. mc .. Huntington Library, Pasadena, Calif.
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
A forward spring; a great mercy on account of the scarcity of hay. No person ever saw such an April in this eastern country, so dry and warm and pleasant. May 1. A fine season as ever was known. May 31. No person in the land ever saw such a spring, so hot and intermixed with seasonable showers. We have ripe strawberries and everything more than a fortnight forwarder than usual. July 15. A wonderful year for grass and hay both English and salt. October - I reckon this month has been September. . . .
And so it was that Providence again showed a kindly face to the Germans at Broad Bay, vouchsafing to them an early season and a year that was propitious for crops.
The war menace did not abate, nor was there any let-up in the preparations for impending trouble. On Saturday, June 2, 1744, Governor Shirley received a letter from His Majesty's minister, the Duke of Newcastle, enclosing His Majesty's and the French king's declaration of war.6 By this time measures for defense were far advanced at Broad Bay. A stockade or blockhouse had been built at the head of tide, in all probability on the bluff above the river on the present site of the dwelling of Alfred Storer. The church which Waldo had been under contract to build had been erected in 1743 on the shore of the Rodney Creamer farm, adjacent to the ferry which crossed the river from this point to Merle Castner's shore. Additional work on this structure in 1744 had converted it into a blockhouse. This work most probably consisted of the building of a stockade of upright logs or timbers forming an enclosure at the center of which was the church. At this point defense on the west side of the river came to an end, and in this connection it should be recalled that the lower west side and the two necks were still at this time largely unsettled areas. The fort at the First Falls served, of course, the upper west and east sides. The latter districts were more completely settled and required more defense. Accordingly, Mr. Zuberbühler's cabin, being larger, stouter, and more commodious than the usual log residence, was surrounded by a sturdy timber stockade. This was located on the same site as the later middle garrison on "Garrison Hill," an ele- vation above the river in the field now owned by Merle Castner, being the land next north of the old Castner Homestead Farm. On the lower east side, Captain Lane's cabin at Schenck's Point was in a similar way made available for defense purposes. These were the four garrisons located in the area then settled to provide points where people might gather for refuge and join one another in warding off attacks.
Three days after Shirley's receipt of the declarations of war he issued impress warrants to the colonels of the several regiments
5Extracts from the Journals of the Rev. Thomas Smith, 1720-1778 (Portland, Me .: Thomas Todd & Co., 1821).
"Correspondence of Wm. Shirley, I, 139-140.
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for the raising and posting of men around the entire Maine frontier. Fifty men were assigned to the garrisons between Brunswick and Damariscotta, and to Colonel Arthur Noble he dispatched orders under date of June 5, 1774, instructing him to assign soldiers to Broad Bay and the Georges area as follows:7
At Madomock or Broad Bay, at Martin's at ye Falls 10 men
At ye new Block House, on ye River, being the Dutch Church 10 men
At Mr. Zuberbühler's Garrison 10 men
At Capt. Lane's at the Point of Broad Bay 10 men
40
At the Garrison at Georges
40 men
Broad Bay and Georges received the largest increments as was fitting, since these two settlements were the real frontiers fac- ing the eastern Indians, the Penobscot, the Cape Sable and the St. Johns, and hence destined to absorb the first shocks from that quarter. The northern frontier of these two outposts, as well as the whole northern line of settlement from the St. Georges to the New Hampshire boundary, was exposed to those tigers from the north, the St. Francis Indians, who were smarting under great wrongs and lusting after a great revenge.
At the time the declaration of war had reached Boston, on June 2, 1744, the assembly was then sitting, and further action was taken immediately in the interest of "Eastern Parts." Five hundred men were voted to be raised for the protection of the frontiers. Three hundred of these were for eastern parts, and the garrisons in this area were reinforced by seventy-three regular fresh recruits. "Within a few days afterwards these soldiers were reinforced with a second supply of Five Hundred men more." Three hundred of these were formed into scouts, and about ninety- six barrels of gunpowder were sent to the several settlements to be sold to the inhabitants "at an advance on prime costs sufficient only to include charges."
As Governor Shirley wrote to the Lords of Trade:
These preparations have had the effect not only to keep the border- ing Indians quiet; But has produced the most strong Professions of Peace from 'em and made them really Sollicitous to prevent a Rupture with us at present; and this has very much encouraged our people upon the Exposed parts of our Frontiers to stand their ground, and saved some young Settlements, where the Inhabitants had begun to draw off their Families, Cattle and Effects, from being entirely broken up.8
Shirley went further in taking steps for the protection of the eastern frontiers. He renewed his treaty with those dreaded foes
"Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., X1, 296-97.
"Correspondence of Wm. Shirley, I, 139-40.
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
of the Maine Indians, the Mohawks and the Six Nations. At his instigation two of the sagamores of these tribes bore a belt of wampum to the Eastern Indians and insisted "upon their observing a strict neutrality between the French and the English, letting them know that by the terms of their Alliance with us the Albany Mohawks would be obliged, if the Eastern Indians broke the peace with us, to take part in our Quarrel. ... This has struck no small terror into the Eastern Indians."9
In consequence of this regional alertness there were no attacks in the Maine area in the summer or autumn of 1744, and during this period the two regiments in the two eastern provinces were brought to their full strength, consisting of two thousand, eight hundred and fifty-five men. One regiment was commanded by Colonel William Pepperell of Kittery and the other by Colonel Samuel Waldo.10 On December 2nd, as an arrangement to provide security during the winter of 1744, one hundred effective men, versed in woodcraft, were to be enlisted out of Colonel Pepperell's regiment and formed into light guard groups stationed at suitable distances from each other, and at convenient places between Ber- wick and St. Georges, whence they were severally to scout through the woods as far as the next station. Each party was put under a sergeant, and all under two able, efficient officers on captain's pay. The distribution of these scouts in our area was as follows:
Fourteen men in Wiscasset to scout as far as Captain Vaughan's block-house in Damariscotta. Fourteen men at his block-house to scout to Broad Bay. Fourteen men at Broad Bay to scout to the block- house at St. Georges river.11
The men at St. Georges had the assignment of scouring the woods beyond as far as the Penobscot River for traces of roving Indians. With this arrangement there were men in the woods all the time and with the garrisons manned, the settlements were rather effectually secured against surprise attacks. Moreover, the neighboring Indians were still quiet; and there was little danger that the St. Francis Indians or those from Cape Sable or St. Johns would cross the wilderness in the depth of winter to attack the settlements. On October 17, 1744, Governor Shirley had published a declaration of war against these two latter tribes who had joined with the French in assailing His Majesty's garrison at Annapolis Royal. This same declaration forbade all the Indians westward of a line, "beginning at three miles eastward of the Passamaquoddy
"Correspondence of Wm. Shirley, I, 139-40.
10William D. Williamson, History of Maine, I, 214. 11 Ibid.
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Broad Bay Goes to War
River, and running north to the St. Lawrence, to have any corre- spondence with those Indian Rebels." Furthermore to all volun- teers who would enter the war at their own charge and expense a premium in the "new tenor bills was offered of £100 for the scalp of a male Indian twelve years old and upwards; £50 for that of a younger one or of a woman; and an additional sum of £5 in either case for a captive."
Throughout 1744 the colony at Broad Bay had a quiet and favorable year for taking root more deeply on the Medomak, albeit the uncertainty of Indian attack was ever present. The Ger- mans were able to go into the first winter of the war with the feeling that preparations for defense were entirely adequate. It was not destined to be a quiet winter, however, for there were rumors afloat of big events impending. It was said that there would be an expedition made up entirely of provincial troops for an attack on the great French fortress of Louisburg at Cape Breton. This fort, of high strategic importance, was situated on Cape Breton Island; and in 1745 it was the major French stronghold in the New World. It was admirably located for intercepting Eng- land's overseas communication with her colonies on the New England Coast, or serving as a base to fall upon them in any attack for their harrying, weakening, or destruction. It also served as a protection for French fisheries on the Atlantic Coast and was a standing threat to New England fishermen in the rich, northern waters.
France had designed it for her strongest fortress in America; and it was, indeed, an elaborate feat of French engineering. The construction work was begun in 1720 and completed in 1733 at a cost of not less than $6,000,000. At that time this was an enormous expense, which led the King and his Council to ask whether its streets were "paved with gold, or the walls composed of louis d'ors." A walk around the enclosing works measured two miles and on the landward side at the base of the wall was a ditch or moat eighty feet wide. In the works themselves were embrasures for one hundred and forty-eight cannon. To the fortress itself there were further defensive adjuncts: an island at the mouth of the harbor was strongly fortified, while on the main opposite to the Island Battery was another work known as the Royal Battery, mounting twenty-eight forty-two pounders and two eighteen pounders. The garrison in 1745 numbered two thousand regulars and militia, while the town within the walls of the fort contained a population of about four thousand.12
The audacious move to attack this fortress came in the nature of a popular demand; at least this is the position taken by
12H. S. Burrage, Maine at Louisburg (Augusta, 1910).
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TOWN AND FORTRESS OF LOUISBURG CAPE BRETON ISLAND Scene of Military Migration of Broad Bay Families, 1745
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Broad Bay Goes to War
the historians. Possibly it would be nearer the truth to say that it seemed to come in the nature of a popular demand, for actually the plan was conceived and first set forth by none other than Colonel Waldo. This was in 1740. Mr. Waldo was in England when war was declared between Great Britain and Spain. It was then that, "a rupture of relations with France being gravely appre- hended," Mr. Waldo laid before the Duke of Newcastle, "one of His Majesty's principal Secretaries of State," a plan for the re- duction of Louisburg as "soon as war with that crown should happen."
Late in 1741 Waldo left England and coming via New York reached Boston on January 19, 1742, where forthwith he laid the plan before Shirley and it received his approval.13 Thereafter the plan slept until France had broken the peace, and Shirley had placed his frontiers in a state to meet the Indian onslaughts. Then rather suddenly, but most likely by prearrangement, the plan be- came a matter of popular demand. Pamphlets supporting the move were printed and circulated, and citizens' committees petitioned the General Court. The strength of the fortress, the difficulty of the undertaking, and the remote possibility of its success were little understood. Francis Parkman spoke of the movement as "a wildly audacious project" which he attributed to "some heated brains." There was some ground for such characterization; for the Province in four previous wars had suffered such extremities at the hands of the Indians, invariably abetted and aided by the French, that the feeling was well nigh universal that France must be driven from Canada. So it seemed almost in answer to popular response that on January 9, 1745, Governor Shirley raised with the General Court the question of an attack on Louisburg to be made by provincial troops unassisted by British regulars.
On January 14th in a letter to the Duke of Newcastle the question was laid before His Majesty's ministers, largely as a matter of information since the plan had previously been approved by the government. On January 25th the General Court took favorable action and noted that "each volunteer be allowed 25s. per month, that there be delivered each man a blanket, that one month's pay be advanced, and that they be entitled to all the Plunder."14 The expedition was immensely popular. Under date of February 22nd, Parson Smith of Falmouth commented in his Journal as follows: "All the talk is about the expedition to Louisburg. There is a mar- velous zeal and concurrence through the whole country with re- spect to it. Such as the like was never seen in this part of the world." The weather, too, facilitated operations through the winter months
13The Case of Samuel Waldo.
14Correspondence of Wm. Shirley, I, 160, 161, 170.
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
of February and March, as Parson Smith observed: "February. A very moderate, pleasant month with little snow or foul weather," and again on March 30th, "This month has been like February; a nonesuch wonderful pleasant and like April."
Under such favorable weather, preparations were able to pro- ceed apace. Speed was the essence of things, for the attack was planned as a surprise and hence it had to be staged before word could reach the French. Enlistments were started at once, and in this and all related fields of activity there was no one more zealously and usefully engaged than Colonel Waldo. In fact, he burned up energy at such a rate that we may pause to speculate on the matter of his motives. Waldo being the man he was, it may be alleged with reasonable certainty that there were other moving causes as well as pure patriotism. Such could have been a desire to dispel for all time the ever-present French and Indian threat to the settle- ments on his grant, or an interest in attaining high military rank, or the prospect of a prestige accruing from military glory, or of being knighted and receiving a title from the Crown. Whatever his motives, known of course for the most part to himself, Mr. Waldo scoured the coast settlements all the way from Salem to the Georges, enlisting men, organizing the levies, and getting them equipped and into training. He enlisted on this tour eight hundred and fifty men, filling his own regiment and raising several com- panies which he turned over to other regiments. In his own settle- ments his success was most marked. Cyrus Eaton states in refer- ence to the settlers at Broad Bay that "they all enlisted under Waldo, and, removing their families to Louisburg, remained there three years."15 This should cause no surprise if it but be recalled that Broad Bay was feudal in tradition and that this tradition had some- thing of the force of unwritten law. Under such tradition lands were held by the vassal in fief, in some cases at Broad Bay for so many peppercorns per annum forever, and in addition the vassal owed service at court and military service to the Liege Lord. Hence Broad Bay, in going all out, was but reacting in terms of an ancient social pattern.
Eaton's statement, construed in terms of what actually did happen at Broad Bay, is somewhat too sweeping; for not all the Germans did go to Louisburg nor was the settlement completely abandoned. Those who were not allowed to join the expedition by Waldo were organized for the defense of the home front. It is undeniably true, however, that Broad Bay did have a large share in the expedition, larger perhaps than any other New England community. Joseph Burns, one of the local English settlers, com- manded a transport which conveyed troops from Boston to Cape
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