USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Waldoboro > History of old Broad Bay and Waldoboro, Volume 1 > Part 23
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 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65
21Mass. Archives, Printed Indian Conference, 1752. [Italics mine.]
22Reverend Smith's Journal, op. cit., p. 149 and Ed. note.
194
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
Margaretha Hilt, wife of Capt. Jacob LUDWIG
This attitude of the Indians and their leaders makes suffi- ciently clear the considerations that guided General Waldo in his tentative disposition of the migration of 1753 on the Medomak. To have given immediate effect to the promise contained in his
195
The Last of the German Migrations
circulars would have been to put these people face to face with hazards they were not equipped to meet and to invite disaster for his own project. Since the land on the lower river was in the main allotted, it was an eminently wise move to locate the new arrivals on the safe side of the deadline rather than to encroach too far on the lands claimed by the Indians. In short, they were located temporarily in a place as strategic and as secure as any that could have been selected from existing free territory.
On this site these newcomers laid the foundations of their first homes in the New World. They were provided by the patron with the essentials for laboring and for living until their first plant- ing should begin to yield its harvest. Many were possessed of the money to meet sundry minor needs, and living as they were in a compact unit they enjoyed a sense of security which the earlier settlers scattered over a wide area could not feel. In Leistner the migrants had a capable and resourceful leader, although murmur- ings were raised against him at times to the effect that his distribu- tion of their stores was not always characterized by the strictest justice and honesty. There is no evidence to confirm such a charge; and in the light of the prestige which he later enjoyed in the col- ony, we may dismiss it. Their life at this time was unquestionably hard, and not being able to procure everything they needed it was only natural that suspicion and criticism should heavily color their thoughts and speech.
In the course of the preceding year a gristmill had been built by George Werner with the aid of General Waldo. According to Cyrus Eaton who follows the testimony of Joseph Ludwig, this gristmill was built near the site of the old Martin and Ector mill at the First Falls,23 and it may be added that Joseph Ludwig was in a position to know where this mill was erected. This view should be accepted rather than that of Miller that it was at the Great Falls on the site of the old Medomak Flour Mill. Miller reaches his conclusion on the basis of a survey of Werner's land made by John Martin, July 31, 1766. There was, to be sure, a gristmill built on this site,24 but it came at a somewhat later date, after the Indian menace had forever been laid low by the impend- ing French and Indian War. Safety as well as utility would have dictated that such an important adjunct to the economic life of the colony would have been located at a spot where it was easily accessible and usable at all times without undue hazard. With a sawmill and a gristmill in operation, the settlement reached a degree of economic stability which left the entire population free to feel that at last a basic sufficiency and permanency had been achieved.
23 Annals of Warren, 1st ed., p. 83.
24 Mass. Archives, Map of 1795.
196
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
The compact outpost on Benner Hill was a settlement of short duration, for war was again at hand, and the entire popula- tion on the Medomak was soon to seek the protective shelter of the five garrisons and to spend a good part of the next seven years within their walls. During this period the lands in the upper part of the town were allotted to the settlers of 1753 not elsewhere provided for, but they were not wholly cleared or occupied until the early 1760's, when the Indian threat had been forever allayed by the issue of war.
A complete roster of the colony of 1753 is no longer pos- sible on the basis of evidence now available or known. In general, it is true, however, that the settlers who reached Broad Bay prior to 1753 settled on the lands between the falls and the lower bay; those who came in 1753 took up land in this same area wherever there were any lots abandoned and unoccupied, but in the main they were settled along the upper river toward the Winslow's Mills and Orff's Corner areas, as well as farther to the eastward along the lower North Waldoborough and Union roads. Among these immigrants of 1753 the following families may be included with reasonable certainty: Benner, Bornheimer, Dahlheim, Heis- ler, Peter Hilt, Hoch, Kaler, Kinsel, Lehr, Levensaler, Leistner, Ludwig, Miller, Mühler, Schuman, Schwartz, Wagner, Weaver, and Welt. These are but a few of the sixty families identifiable with this migration, and it is a list which in the case of certain names will some day be subject to some revision on the basis of evidence which is documentary rather than circumstantial.
XII
BROAD BAY IN THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR
... Farewell, happy fields, Where joy forever dwells! Hail, horrors! Hail Infernal world! JOHN MILTON
A FTER BROAD BAY HAD RE-ESTABLISHED itself at the close of the Fifth Indian War, an early move on the part of the settlers had been to strengthen their claims to the lands originally promised and allotted by General Waldo. As a consequence of their in- sistence, the early 1750's witnessed the general granting of the first deeds to the Germans. These early grants of title were to lands on the east side of the river where the immigrants of the earlier migrations seem to have settled. In the areas settled by the Germans practically all the allotments carried a frontage of twenty- five rods on the river and extended backward in an easterly direc- tion for a distance sufficient to give to each farm the promised one hundred acres. Among these earliest grants were the following: John Ulmer, Jr., April 6, 1752, the old James H. Castner farm; David Rominger, October 18, 1753, the farm now divided and owned by Ralph Hoffses, Jasper J. Stahl, and the heirs of the Fred Scott estate; just north of David Rominger's farm was that of his brother Philip, allotted December 18, 1753. Typical of all these early deeds is one of July 24, 1753, conveying to Loring Sides (Lorenz Seitz) that farm owned and occupied for so many years by Captain Albion F. Stahl, embracing the land between the farms now owned and occupied by the heirs of Winfield G. Ewell on the south, and by the heirs of Laurence Davis on the north. The deed is here given in the parts essential to making clear the condi- tions under which these early grants were made by Waldo in his lifetime:
. Whereas Loran Sides of Broad Bay ... farmer, hath agreed with the said Samll Waldo to settle the lands hereinafter mentioned .. . in the manner following; that is to say, to build thereon a Dwelling house of Eighteen feet Square, at the least, within two months, from the Date hereof and dwell constantly therein, either in his own person or by a
198
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
Tenant, the full Term of three Years, from building the same and within the space of one year next ensuing the Date hereof, Clear and Subdue four acres of said land.
Now Know Ye, that in consideration thereof, and also of the rent hereinafter reserved, the s-d Samuel Waldo hath given and Granted .. . all that Certain tract of upland and Swamp, situate, lying and being at a place Called Broad-Bay, in the Eastern parts of this province, contain- ing one hundred acres, being Butted and Bounded, viz, beginning at a stake marked number Eight, upon the Eastern side of Broad Bay River, said lot to run fronting the river, twenty-five rods to another stake marked number nine, which joins the lot of Philip Fogler, and from said two stakes to run back a East course of the Compass, untill the said one hundred Acres are made up and Compleated. ...
To Have And To Hold the said one hundred Acres of land and premisses ... he the said Loran Sides, yielding and paying therefor Yearly and every Year on the twenty-ninth day of September unto the said Samuel Waldo, his heirs and Assigns, the rent of one pepper Corn, if the same shall be lawfully demanded: provided always nevertheless .. . that if the said Loran Sides or his heirs shall not build thereon a dwelling house of at least Eighteen feet Square within two months from the Date hereof and Constantly dwell therein, either in his own person or by a Tenant the full term of three years ... clear and subdue four acres of said land, then and in such Case ... this present deed and the Estate hereby Granted, shall Cease, determine and be void, ... and it shall and may be lawfull, to and for the said Samuel Waldo his heirs and Assigns . .. to re-enter and hold the same, as in his and their first and former Estate before the making of these presents.
In Witness whereof the said Samuel Waldo hath hereunto set his hand and Seal the 24th day of July in the 26th Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord, George, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King Defender of the Faith etc., and in the Year of our Lord Christ, one thousand, seven hundred and fifty-three.1
The conditions set forth in this typical deed had long since been completed by the older settlers at the time their titles were issued. Deeds conveying a title to lands on the eastern bank of the Medomak proved themselves valid in time. But those conveying land on the western bank proved invalid in the face of the demand of the Pemaquid claimants. However, such troubles were for the future. For the present the landed and the landless were destined to share a common lot in the face of the threat from a common foe.
The Peace of Aix-la-chapelle in 1748 had been inconclusive. It was but a breathing spell. The real question, still unsettled, was the supremacy on the North American continent of either Britain or France. The brief interlude of peace had been used by France to extend her far-flung line of trading posts on the great Mississippi and to establish her hold at strategic points on its tributaries. One of these was at Fort Duquesne in western Pennsylvania, the site of the present city of Pittsburgh. Such acts were a defiance of British rights and claims to the Virginia territory, which was construed
1Lincoln County Registry of Deeds, Bk. I, p. 40.
199
The French and Indian War
as stretching overland to the Pacific. Western Pennsylvania and the Ohio River valley was a rich area, and England was not dis- posed to yield it to the French. Indeed, the advantage was all with the former, for at this time the French population on the con- tinent did not exceed eighty thousand, French and half-breeds; while the English settlers, drawn from various nationalities, were stretched more compactly over a wide coastal area and numbered one and one half million people. The English demand that the French vacate the Western Pennsylvania and Ohio areas was de- livered at the gate of Fort Le Boeuf on December 11, 1756, by an officer of the militia of Virginia, recently arrived at manhood. This demand was rejected and war thereby was virtually assured, although a formal declaration did not come until three years later. The existing tension, however, was all that the French needed to incite their red allies to action. In New England they became more restive and menacing. The settlers at Broad Bay clearly sensed im- pending danger and bestirred themselves to meet it.
The first move made at Broad Bay for preparation and de- fense took the form of a petition directed to Governor Shirley. This revealing document is here printed in full along with the embellishments added by the translator:
TRANSLATION OF A HUMBLE PETITION WRITTEN BY THE GERMAN SETTLERS AT BROAD BAY To His Excellence WILLIAM SHIRLEY, Esqr. Governor of Ye Massachusetts Bay at Boston, dated the 13. Maji 1754: translated the 11. Juin 1754; by John Ernest Knöchel, sometime ago Secretary of several imperial Commissions in Germaine. Pt. prospiciendum ipsis, necessariis supplementis, tam quo ad alimentationem quam defensionem tempori belli immentis.2 To His Excellency, William Shirley, Esqr., Gouvernour of Ye Massa- chusetts Bay at Boston.
Most noble born, most noble grave, most honoured Lord, Gouver- nor! Your excellence will excuse the liberté, we poor deserted Germans take, in addressing our most humble petition to you; Considering: that above 130 Familes, containing almost 500 sools, live at Broad Bay, being thus abandonet, that in cas, there should happen a War (which is the common report.) having no Guarrison, we must be exposed to the dan- ger of being killed by the Indians, one after another, in our own houses. If we should build 2 or 3 Guarrisons; meerly any old Settlers being pro- vided whit provisions for a couple of Weeks by themselfs, and the New Komers of the Year 1753 by Mr. Waldo: but none of those Settlers that arrived in the year 1752: we must expect to starve for Hunger: over and besides, for want of Powder, Bullets and Flints, we should can not defend us self. Therefore we poor deserted Subjects in common, implore your Excel. Graciousness, (regarding you as the Father of the Land) to assisst
2Especially must they provide, with the necessary assistance, as much for provi- sioning as for defense in time of imminent war.
200
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
us, your poor children, for the Sak of God, and to deliver us from those miseries. We shall never dare to prescribe Your Excel. what to do, or in what manner we should be saved; your Wisdom will suppeditate to you by what means we poor deserted Germans must be supported, in the afore mentioned points; by Your Excel. Favour.
We are in the utmost subjection, Your Excellence most humble and most obedient Subjects.
Broad Bay, the 13th Maji., 1754.
Signatum Mathäus Römele
Casimir Läsch
Johann Ulmer, Cap.
Jacob Waltz Paulus Dochtermann
Johann Martin Reiser
John Jacob Ulmer
Laurentius X. Seitz
Philipp Rinner
Conrad Treupel
Joh. Martin Ulmer
Jacob Deis
Joh. Heinrich
Phillip Vogler
Valentin Jung
Demuth
David Rominger
Frantz X Eisele
Jacob Lau[e]r
N.B. Those subscriptions serve for all the Settlers, who living very much dispersed, can not always assemble.3
Knöchel, the translator of this petition, was bilingual, and some knowledge of his French and German makes clear the mean- ing of this mangled piece of English. Certain other observations also are here in order. The population figure given is clearly an underestimate, the number of families and the total number of "sools" being factually inconsistent. That there were no garrisons would seem to indicate that the material making up the forts twelve years before had been used for homes. The unintelligible comments on the food situation are explainable as follows: the older settlers, if they should all garrison up, would have a supply of food sufficient for a number of weeks; those in the 1753 migra- tion would have their Waldo rations, but the migrants of 1752, now living on a hand-to-mouth basis, would be totally unprovided for.
On Waldo's advice this petition was addressed directly to Governor Shirley by the settlers. Waldo's mediation in this situ- ation would have been utterly useless, since he and Shirley were bitter enemies. The most interesting and significant aspect of the petition is, perhaps, the highly obsequious language in which it is phrased, which reveals the abject, feudal attitude of these early Germans toward the Obrigkeit. This is indubitably a carryover from Old World conditions, and it should make clear that Broad Bay in its early days was a tiny bit of medievalism set down in the Maine wilderness. Probably nowhere else in all New England could such a striking anachronism have been found.
The portents of coming war were even clearer to the gov- ernment in Boston than they were to the distressed Germans at
3Mass. Records, XV A, 240-242.
20
The French and Indian War
Broad Bay, and limited aid was not long deferred. Six hundred guns and fifteen hundred casks of powder were in a short time dis- tributed in Maine. Broad Bay's share was little enough; three half barrels of gunpowder and a proportionate supply of bullets and flints.4 The summer of 1754 was a period in which Broad Bay gave itself over to war preparations. The erection of a large fort by Gen- eral Waldo on the site of the old Mill Garrison restored confidence and morale. In later years opinions have differed in reference to the location of this fort. Miller has placed it on the eastern side of the Falls at the old "Sproul's Spring," but such an hypothesis seems untenable, as no considerations of military strategy could possibly have warranted such a location. From the higher land directly east and from the steep bluff directly across the river, the interior of the stockade could with the greatest ease have been constantly raked by rifle fire, and the inmates picked off, one by one, as they might appear from the barracks moving about the stockade. In the erection of a fort the first consideration would have been given to a commanding position, and so it unquestionably was with the Mill Garrison. There was but one such location near the Falls and that was on the bluff due west above the river on the property now occupied by Alfred Storer, and on the land immediately to the westward of his lot. This is a location confirmed by the best con- temporary evidence we have. Joseph Ludwig is cited by Cyrus Eaton as placing "the stockade on the western side of the river near the mills."5 The mills in question were a sawmill and a grist- mill located on the eastern bank within easy range of the protec- tive fire of the fort. Joseph Ludwig was of the migration of 1753 of which the largest number was to make its home in the mill gar- rison for the next seven years. As one who was to make this a refuge for so long a time, he was certainly in a position to speak with some authority on the question of its location.
Unfortunately we have not been able to locate a ground plan of Waldo's fort. Rattermann states that it was of a size sufficient to afford refuge for from five to six hundred people.6 This is probably not an exaggeration despite the figures set in the Petition of this year. A careful study of the migrations reveals a much larger population, and the Reverend J. W. Starman held that there were fifteen hundred Germans on the Medomak in 1753.7 In our belief the settlement at this time numbered around one thousand people.
In structure the Mill Garrison certainly followed the pattern of the forts on the Kennebec, and especially of that on the Georges.
"Mass. Court Records, XII, 351.
5 Annals of Warren, 1st ed. (Hallowell, 1851), p. 88.
6H. A. Rattermann, Der Deutsche Pionier (Cincinnati, 1869-87), XVI Jahrgang. "Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., V, 404.
202
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
There was an outer or surrounding stockade of hewn logs twenty inches square and sixteen feet in height set firmly in the earth in an upright position. Within were the barracks built of timber against the walls of the stockade and divided into compartments which were occupied by the garrison and by the families assigned to the post for protection. Attacks were repelled by men standing on the flat roofs of these barracks which abutted the stockade. Similar in structure and location were the store rooms, and the magazine was probably located underground. Tradition has it that General Waldo had a house erected for himself within the stockade. In practically all the forts of the period located on water there was a covered way built of logs extending down to the waterfront and terminat- ing in a small blockhouse at the water's edge. In the Mill Garrison such a covered passage would have run from the northeast side of the stockade down to the falls and the tidewater, thus insuring a supply of water for the garrison as well as communication by wa- ter with the Province Sloop which discharged supplies a short dis- tance below on the river.
Joseph Ludwig and Charles Leissner are the main authorities concerning four smaller blockhouses farther down the river. There were two on each side of the Medomak, each located at a strategic point in order to provide protection and quick refuge for the set- tlers on farms more nearly adjacent. These were all erected by the settlers themselves in the summer of 1754, and consisted of smaller stockades from ten to sixteen feet high, made as in the case of the Mill Garrison by setting hewn timbers upright in the ground. The quarters were built of timber against the interior wall, and each fort was large enough to provide residence for the garrison and sixteen families. This would mean that each could harbor a mini- mum of one hundred persons.
There were two of these smaller garrisons on the east side of the river. The first one was located on a hill ("Garrison Hill") on the old Ludwig Castner farm which is next north of the present Castner Homestead. In his lifetime Charles H. Lilly told us that he removed from the hill a large boulder with a bowl-shaped top, obviously used by the Garrison as well as those who had taken refuge there for the grinding of their grain for baking. Mr. Lilly, whose memory reached back seventy years, also recalled the great quantities of tansy8 which grew around the old site, possibly the last remnant of an herb garden which the settlers had cultivated for their common use during the years when the garrison was their main residence. Farther down the river was "the lower garrison," whose location is a matter of some uncertainty. It was in all prob- ability near "the town landing" which was located on the present
8An herb used in medicine as a tonic and as a seasoning in food.
203
The French and Indian War
estate of Mrs. Russell Cooney at Trowbridge's Point. Here the channel sets in somewhat closer to the shore, and here it was that the coasters discharged and loaded in the early days. The garrison was either near this point or a little lower down on the next, or Schenck's Point. The road running west past the Mink homestead and the residence of Harold W. Moody extended in an earlier day to the shore and connected the town landing with the main high- way running north and south.9
On the west side of the river "the middle garrison" seems to have been located nearly opposite the one on the east side. It was back on rising ground a short distance from the western terminus of Light's Ferry on the Rodney Creamer farm. In this area there are the remains of a number of rocked-up cabin cellars clustered closely together, which seem to have been inside the stockade. Many years ago on this old site Mr. Rodney Creamer excavated a goodly number of old relics: shears, pewter, cutlery, a huge lock, and two twelve-pound cannon balls. The location of the lower garrison on the west side is a matter of some conjecture. Considera- tions of strategic placement would call for a site on the upper end of "the Dutch Neck," which at this time was entirely settled. Joseph Ludwig is cited by Cyrus Eaton as stating that after cer- tain casualties inflicted by the Indians on the east side, "their neigh- bors," probably cut off from the garrison, "then moved over to the Dutch Neck for greater security." It seems that such a move would hardly have been made if there had been no garrison in that area as a refuge against Indian attack. Confirmative evidence of the location of this garrison was unearthed in 1949, when Charles Castner, an employee of S. H. Weston & Sons, found a button bearing the inscription "Montreal British Militia." This was un- earthed amid lime lumps while Castner was digging a ditch on the farm next to the Herbert Geele home. In addition to these five garrisons, three additional ones were planned, but apparently were never erected, and any speculation as to their projected location would be but a vain gesture.
By the autumn of 1754 these preparations for defense had been completed at Broad Bay. It had been a busy season. Men, women, and children had worked the daylight hours through to cultivate crops and increase food supplies, and to make up for the loss of a great deal of labor that had necessarily been diverted to the construction of the defensive posts. At this time the economy of the earlier colonists would have been reasonably stable under peace conditions. Most of them had cows; there were a few oxen, and pigs and poultry were plentiful. The food amounts derived from agriculture, however, were still limited. Plows at this time
"Traditionary, Daniel W. Castner (1832-1909).
204
HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
were not a part of the settlers' equipment, and all land had to be prepared for the seed by hand. This limited the quantity of the crops and necessitated that the women be as active in the fields as the men. The families of the migrants of 1742 and 1748 had been able to achieve economic security on a limited scale, but those of 1752 were restricted in their food resources by the lack of cleared land and farming equipment, while those of 1753 were still de- pendent on the food supplies provided by General Waldo. With the advent of winter their needs were to become acute as they had been able to clear but little land for that season's crops. These in brief were the conditions confronting the Broad Bayers as they faced into the Seven Years' War.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.