USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Waldoboro > History of old Broad Bay and Waldoboro, Volume 1 > Part 53
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Tories from other colonies were also active in these raids. Certain Maine towns had long been a haven for them. As early in the war as the British occupation of New York, a plan had been drawn to cut Maine off from Massachusetts and use it as a refuge for loyalists, with Falmouth as capital and William Pep- perell, a grandson of the baronet, as governor. With the arrest and expulsion of some of the leading Maine Tories, this scheme collapsed, but it remained true that loyalists were treated more indulgently here than they were farther to the westward, which in these days accounted for the presence of strange faces in this section of the county.
One of the most notorious of such guests was Captain John Long who moved about freely and in whose wake mischief in- variably followed. This year he was cornered in Warren and despite his threats of death and the flourishes of his big knife, he was unable at the end to disengage himself from the bearlike embrace of John Spear. He was disarmed, pinioned, and brought to Waldoborough on horseback, here to be received by a relay of guards who were to escort him to the county jail. Just what hap- pened while he was in the custody of the Waldoborough men remains a mystery, but Captain John made his escape and con- tinued his mischief into 1781 when he was finally lodged in the Boston jail. This incident is cited here not as exceptional but as a rather typical common occurrence.
To meet the distresses of the "Eastern people" General Peleg Wadsworth was appointed in 1780 to command the whole Eastern Department between Piscataqua and St. Croix. This year the ice went out of the rivers around April 16th, and shortly thereafter the General set up his headquarters in Thomaston. He was given a command of eight hundred men and was empowered
40Oral tradition: Alfred Storer from his great-grandmother, Nancy Farnsworth.
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to raise a company of volunteers in Lincoln County and to apply martial law in a district ten miles in width along the coast east of the Kennebec. This is believed to be the only time that the civil law was ever suspended in Waldoborough since its incorpora- tion. The General also issued a proclamation interdicting all inter- course with the enemy, British and Tory alike. This was a difficult edict to enforce since in the nature of the situation it forbade intercourse between friends and even between members of the same family. It was useful, however, since there was a good deal of illicit trade with the enemy, some of which was carried on by the thrifty "Dutch" and Puritans in sub rosa fashion at Waldo- borough. In order to avoid detection, they had beaten a trail through the woods north of the town and across to the Penobscot. This trail ran through North Waldoborough north of the Medo- mak Pond, thence northeast behind the mountains, passing a con- siderable distance north of Union and then due east to the Penob- scot. Along this route the "Dutch" drove their herds of beef on the hoof where it was received at the river by the British for the use of their force at Castine.
In this way some of the men of Waldoborough who were not too ardent in the cause of freedom were able to turn an honest penny in sound money. Such action aroused the ire of the patriots in Union, who plotted to break up this traffic by raiding the "Dutch" in transit. The latter, however, were always successful in outwitting their angry neighbors.41 Waldoborough, in fact, was something of a thorn in the General's flesh from the beginning, for as early as April 1780 he reported to the Council in Boston as follows: "The enemie's garrison does not exceed 500 land forces, exclusive of about forty tories that have joined them this spring chiefly from this town [Thomaston] and Waldoboro." In a later report he lists "George Smouse, a traitor that made his escape from my guard and joined the enemy." His list also carries the names of Jacob Young, George Cline and son Joseph.42
General Wadsworth stationed his forces at strategic points along the coast. His object was to put an end to British incursions on the west side of the Penobscot and to control the activities of the Tories in the area west of the river. The eastern outpost of this defense system was composed of two hundred militiamen at Camden under the command of Captain George Ulmer of Waldo- borough. Smaller contingents were posted at other points. This unquestionably served as a deterrent, but it could not keep the Tories from breaking through into uncovered spots. In the spring of this year Waldoborough was such a point and the scene of an outrage that led Wadsworth to adopt the sternest measures.
41Sibley, History of the Town of Union.
42Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., XVIII, 304-305.
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This outbreak occurred on the west side of the river. A small band of Tories, taking a young man, Stephen Pendleton by name, from one of the islands in Muscongus Bay as their pilot, proceeded up the Medomak under cover of darkness, landed on the shore and secreted themselves before dawn in Levi Soule's barn. Soule's homestead was the old Friedrich Kuentzel farm, Lot No. 16, lo- cated exactly one and one quarter miles below the first falls of the river. Soule was the son of Captain Nathan, originally of Dux- bury. When Mr. Levi Soule came out at dawn to look after his stock, he was surprised, taken, bound, and returned to his wife's room in the house. While the band was searching the premises for valuables, Pendleton was left to guard the prisoner. In the meantime Soule took a knife lying on the table and dropping it on the bed instructed his wife to cut the bonds. Pendleton covered the prisoner with his rifle and threatened to shoot. Soule's reply was: "Cut!" Whereupon he was shot by the guard, the same bullet breaking one of Mrs. Soule's fingers.
The sound of the gun in the quiet of the early morning alarmed the neighbors, and the Tories were compelled to flee to the woods. A posse was raised and a grand manhunt started which continued for several days. The first day the pursuers were eluded, and thereafter the raiders travelled by night, subsisting on the bark of trees; and by following a circuitous route back to the mountains, they reached the Penobscot and took refuge at Castine. For many years thereafter the widow was wont to relate the story of this tragic event, showing her crooked finger as evi- dence of the veracity of her tale.43 The sequel of this episode is found in a resolution of the House of Representatives under date of April 26, 1781: "Whereas Stephen Pendleton of Penobscot Sound, who last summer murdered Mr. Soule of Broad Bay .. . et alii, are now held as Prisoners, lately taken on board an armed sloop in the enemy's service ... the Governor is requested to take measures that sd. Pendleton .. . be effectually secured for trial." John Hancock, in disapproving the resolve, stated laconically, and it may be added, incomprehensibly: "It would be necessary that I should be furnished with the evidence of his being the Murderer.44
At about this same time, Captain Charles Samson had a brush with the enemy. Another small party of Tory raiders proceeding up the bay landed on the east side, on the shore of the Samson farm, and made an attempt on the person of the Captain by way of repayment of an ancient grudge. Mr. Samson, however, was aroused before the Tories had forced an entrance and consequently
43 Account based on Eaton's Annals of Warren, and Samuel L. Miller, History of Waldoboro.
#Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., XIX, 222-223.
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was able to defend his castle until the racket of gunfire raised an alarm which caused the attackers to flee.
Aroused by these outrages, General Wadsworth issued a proclamation prescribing the penalty of death to anyone aiding or secreting the enemy. The first victim of this edict was Jeremiah Braun, a dim-wit from the Damariscotta area, who was appre- hended guiding a pillaging band through the back-country. He was tried by court-martial on August 23rd at Thomaston, con- victed, and sentenced to be hanged. It was quite generally felt that Braun was too simple to comprehend the meaning of his action; and there were a goodly number of people, largely women to be sure, who interceded for his pardon; but Wadsworth was inflexible and the following day gallows were erected on Limestone Hill, "and the miserable man conducted to them in a cart, fainting at the sight and rendered insensible from fear." In this connection Williamson observes that "this act of severity though painful in the last degree to the General, proved a salutary preventive of similar transgressions - in verification of the maxim - 'retributive justice to foes is safety to friends.' "45
Another troublesome Tory was Nathaniel Palmer, the pirate of Broad Cove. In the Waldoborough area he was generally be- lieved to be the leader of a small gang of pirates operating among the islands of Muscongus Bay and preying on coasting vessels bound to and from Waldoborough and points farther east. This was such a nuisance to the local folk deprived in this manner of their property and their freight, that the evidence was accumulated which led to his arrest and trial. The case against him must have been convincing, for he, too, was condemned by a court-martial. Palmer, however, cheated the gallows by escaping from his guard. Years later he returned to his old home, where he resided un- molested for the rest of his days, living the life of a pariah.
Such events were typical of the whole year in Waldobor- ough. The record of Lieutenant Burton's notebook indicates from the assignment of officials to court-martial duty that a good many Tories must have faced military justice even though the names of no others have been preserved. In December the troops which had been called out in the spring went into winter quarters in their own homes; and General Wadsworth was left at his head- quarters in Thomaston, with a small guard made up of militiamen detailed to this service from the surrounding towns.
The British at Castine, through their intelligence service, were thoroughly informed of Wadsworth's defenseless status. Accordingly, on the night of February 18, 1781, he was taken prisoner by a group of raiders and removed to Castine. Philip
4Williamson, History of Maine, TT, 482.
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Sechrist of Waldoborough was one of the bodyguards and in their struggle with the British, several of the enemy were killed or wounded, and one of the guards, Hickey by name, was badly wounded in the thigh. As soon as his condition would permit, he was, by the strange irony of fate, taken to Waldoborough and placed under the care of Doctor Schaeffer.46
The depredations committed by the British, the Tories, and their outlaw associates, and the acts of retaliation and revenge which they occasioned, reached their climax in 1781. Acute eco- nomic distress was general in all the towns and plantations. In addition to the local taxes, the General Court continued to call on the several towns for their quotas of soldiers and for particular articles such as blankets, shirts, shoes, stockings, and beef. The muster-masters and collectors ranged the county to see that these levies were forthcoming. Such taxes and paying the wages of her soldiers in the service was not entirely pleasing to Waldoborough folk. The Germans had little money and even when they had more they were slow to part with it. In keeping with this attitude, the town voted on February 8, 1781, "to postpone the matter concern- ing raising men for the continental service till the town has peti- tioned to the Honorable Court and received an answer." This petition in all probability urged the Governor to review with General Washington the critical and distressing condition of these eastern towns and to suggest to him that the five hundred men to be raised this year in Maine be retained for local service (which Governor Hancock actually did.) Happy as Washington said he would be to grant such a request if practicable, he could not dis- pense with the eastern recruits and said they should not delay to join General Lincoln at Newport, since an attack by the enemy in New York was daily expected. This year Waldoborough seems not only to have balked at this request, but also along the entire line, for on September 3rd it was "voted unanimously not to pay any more taxes until further orders." Such recalcitrancy may have arisen from the fact that the Court had previously abated all taxes in some of the plantations a little farther east and in the more immediate theater of the war, and that Waldoborough was under the firm conviction that a similar concession was its due.
The good local people did not stop at this point. They went further and on December 24th "voted that the town is not able to pay the beef tax." Possibly so much local beef had already gone on the hoof to the British at Castine, that the supply may have been a little low, or possibly Tory votes were instrumental in reaching such a decision. In the case of the tax there is ground for believing that a number of local patriots advanced the beef
46Cyrus Eaton, Annals of Warren, 2nd ed. (Hallowell, 1877), p. 198.
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poundage on their own responsibility and that after the war the town reconsidered its action on the question of payment, for on January 8, 1783, it was "voted to raise money to Sq. Thomas beef charges," and again in 1786 a committee was appointed "to Rectife any Mistakes about a tax cald the Beif tax." This committee re- ported that "there ought to be abate in what is cald the Areage tax to the persons hereafter mentioned" - apparently an abate- ment in real-estate taxes to those who had supplied the beef. This roll of honor includes the names of John Weaver, Matthias Rem- illy, John Ulmer, Martin Razor, George Demuth, Francis Isley, Ludwig Kastner, John Newbert, Lorain Sides, Christopher New- bert, Matthias Storer, Andrew Storer, and John Vogler. In reply to Washington's insistence that he must have men, the town as its last reluctant act of the year tardily voted on December 24th "to choose a committee to get men for the continental service for three years or during the war."47
Judge Williamson states that "never, in the savage wars, had this eastern country been infested with any worse than her present enemies. They were vile mercenaries, renegades, and re- vengeful tories and freebooters, whose business it was to deal in blood, treachery, and plunder."48 In the face of such calamities it cannot be said that Massachusetts was indifferent to this Eastern District. The Court this year passed measures to inflict on prisoners the same ill-treatment which the eastern people were receiving; to adopt more efficient measures for defense; to furnish bounties ranging from £50 to £120; to encourage privateering; to employ in such a capacity sloops, row-galleys, and whaleboats mounting cannon, and to have the French admiral at Newport send a frigate and cruisers to eastern waters. Samuel McCobb of Georgetown was promoted to the rank of brigadier general and placed in com- mand of the forces in this area. Such measures mitigated but did not bring an end to the internecine strife.
A great hope, however, was born when the news reached this section that on October 27th Lord Cornwallis had been compelled to surrender the British Army at Yorktown. By proclamation the Congress set December 13th as a day when the people should repair to their churches in Thanksgiving and prayer. În Waldo- borough the day was observed by the Tories with apprehension, by the neutrals with indifference, and by the patriots with jubila- tion; for it meant in all probability the end of major military operations; and thus the conclusion of danger and extraordinary sacrifice.
Although the major struggle was ended, the war continued to smoulder in these eastern parts. The only act bearing on the
47 Records of the Town Clerk, Waldoborough, for the year 1781.
48Williamson, History of Maine, II, 496-497.
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war in the town records of 1782 came in March when it was voted that "Capt. Samuel Gragge [Gregg] be put on the Committee of Correspondence." Captain Gregg had been the firebrand of the patriots on the Georges in the early days of the war and in its later years a constant privateersman. In 1781 he had moved to Waldoborough to be near his old kinsman and companion in the Indian wars, Colonel William Farnsworth. Thereafter the two were never separated and their earthly remains have been lying side by side for the past century and a half in the little private cemetery on the old Farnsworth estate.49
On the 30th of November, the commissioners representing the belligerents agreed on the provisional articles whereunder Great Britain acknowledged the complete independence of the thirteen colonies. The definitive treaty was signed at Paris, Sep- tember 3, 1783. This was followed by an entire cessation of hostilities, the withdrawal of the British from the colonies, and the disbanding of the American Army on October 18, 1783. It was not, however, until December that the garrison at Castine was broken up and the post abandoned. Thus it may be said that the war was waged in Lincoln County longer than in any other part of the country. The year 1783, however, had been an entirely quiet one. There was even some fraternization of the British soldiery in some of the Penobscot towns, which led to a number of desertions from the enemy force on the part of men who ulti- mately settled in these parts.
It has been repeatedly emphasized in this chapter that the rift in Waldoborough between patriot and Tory was never char- acterized by outrage, but merely by strain, suspicion, and a silent social pressure. In a comparatively short time this rift healed as inevitably as a wound in healthy tissue, leaving an united citizenry facing the problems of peace. Just what were these problems and what had been the effect of eight years of war on the town?
The economic derangement effected by the war is offered here in the words of those who lived through it and experienced its effects. We are fortunate in having such a contemporary evalua- tion which enables us to see the problems faced through the eyes of those who faced them. This document is a petition seeking relief from taxation; and if we are to make due allowance for overstatement, the residuum leaves with us a faithful picture of conditions existing in the town in the spring of 1783. The words of the petition follow:
To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives in Gen- eral Court Assembled.
The Petition of the town of Waldoborough in the County of Lin- coln Humbly Sheweth, that by Reason of the Late War, this town has
49Summer residence of Mr. Glenn Mayo, of San Antonio, Texas.
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been Reduced to Great Distress, and though now by the Blessing of Providence Peace be Restored unto us: yet we shall sorely feele the Effects of the War. By our Enemies taking Post at Penobscut and Con- tinually infesting this Coast with their Privateers and small Boatts, our Lumber and fishing Trade in which alone we had any Concern Has been almost totally Suppressed, almost Every Vesel we owned in the Beginning of the War, fell into their hands: and tho from time to time Vesels have been purchased, Money borrowed for this purpose, whereby a debt has been Contracted, as the Inhabitants Could not possibly sub- sist without Some to convey their lumber to Market, yet of this we have been stript of our Lumber and fish on Boord, or the Returns of it in Provision for the Support of our families, so that by a Late Compu- tation our Losses by water amounts to £3160, Besides the Arms, Ammu- nition Provisions and Apparels that have been taken by Plundering Refugees. The Season for a Number of years Past have been Verry un- favourable, and the Drought so severe that the Peoples Attention has been more than Ever to Cultivate their farms; yet they have not been able to Raise above half enough of Bread for their Consumption, and the risque of Importation being so Great and many Dispos'd to take advantage of the necessities of others, there by the Price of the Neces- sities of Life has been raised so high that People were in the Greatest Difficultys and obliged to part with every Commodity they had to Dispose at the Buyers Price, so that Corn has been sold for four Dollars and more, and other articles in Proportion. Our hay has also been Cut off with the Drought for several years, so that our Stoks has greatly Diminished by what they were at the Beginning of the War, and at Present there is such a Scarcity of Bread that hardly all the Lumber we have on hand can procure us bread for the Season, a Cord of Wood not fetching above half a Bushel of Corn Besides the Debt contracted by Individuals thro the occasions by the War, the most part of the State Taxes for some years have not been Discharged and the town is utterly unable to Discharg the same, and if your Honours should now exact from us these taxes it would utterly Ruin the town, and Give such a Crush to the town, as it Could not for many years Recover of, and Put it out of its Power for the future to pay Such a Proportion of taxes for Defraying the Expences of Government as otherwise it might. We would therefore beg your Honours would take our Distressing Situa- tion under your serious Consideration and Discharge us of these taxes that were Due before Peace was made, and your Petitioners as in Duty bound shall ever Pray
Philip M. Ulmer Joshua Howard Jacob Ludwig Selectmen of Waldoborough
Waldoborough, May: 13: 1783.50
Of understatement on the question of taxes the people of Waldoborough were never guilty. When due allowance is made for this fact, we are still left to infer a highly distressing condition and a standard of living that must have reminded the older in- habitants of earlier days, and perhaps worst of all a burden of debt that was bound to cripple the economy and reduce the level of well-being for years to come.
50Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., 2nd Ser., XX, 227.
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The social repercussions of the war brought changes no less deep, but perhaps more happy and more enduring. In earlier chap- ters, there has been set forth an analysis of those forces remoulding the feudal German society on the Medomak into an English colonial town. First in order of time were the social patterns brought from Massachusetts by the Puritans during their period of infiltration of the late 1760's; second, the ingrafting of the demo- cratic civil forms of the New England Town Meeting on the trunk of the old feudal tree; third, the impact of the American Revolution from 1775 to 1783, and its influence was very marked indeed. In season and out, through these years, the principles of freedom, of self-government, and the rights of man were dinned into German ears. They were the theme of daily discussion by every fireside; they were the source of endless and varied social pressures; they were everlastingly creating situations to which the Teuton was compelled to adjust himself, and this he could do only by discarding his former preconceptions in order to com- prehend forces which were buffeting him about.
In order to find himself and to keep his footing amid pre- vailing chaos, he was compelled to think in terms of the entirely new and strange values set forth either by Tory or patriot. For the one, he was bound to suffer persecution and find his estates confiscate; for the other he wove, spun, knit, surrendered his cattle, paid burdensome taxes, and perhaps risked his blood. In the face of such sacrifices, he was forced to grope for the under- lying meanings and to reach interpretations of them. Lastly, but in no sense least, this struggle snatched him from his own fireside and bore him far away into the new English world, to Machias, Castine, Boston, New York, Saratoga, Valley Forge, Philadelphia, and Yorktown. He drilled, camped, cooked, ate, and fought by the side of other and different Americans. He suffered with them, was nursed in their hospitals, learned to speak their language, to adopt their ways, and to accept their views of the meaning of this struggle. He finally triumphed with them and when he returned to his humble home he was different in consequence of what he had undergone. The war was his melting pot and from this crucible the second generation of Germans emerged as men very different from their fathers. A new social pattern was in vogue on the Medomak and the older mode of life and thought receded deeper into the past. Two forces alone were left which were to per- petuate the older culture in dimmer outline for another half century. These were the German language and the Lutheran faith.
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ANNALS OF THE 1780's
Even as are the generations of leaves, such are those likewise of men.
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