USA > Maine > York County > York > New England miniature; a history of York, Maine > Part 6
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The Massacre of 1692 was the greatest calamity caused by Indian attack upon York. With each succeeding war with the red men the frontier was farther removed from southern Maine. Homes were still devastated and flocks destroyed, persons killed or taken captive in isolated regions, by small bands in sporadic attacks, yet York progressed steadily in spite of other wars with the Indians or with the French.
In 1702, when King William died, his sister-in-law, Queen Anne, who succeeded him, straightway declared war on France. Promptly the French in Canada incited the Indians to renew hostilities against the colonists, and they developed a new and even more fiendish manner of attack. Instead of descending upon one settlement at a time, during which engagement a few might escape and warn other towns, the new plan was to send separate bands against several places at the same time, so that no town could warn or aid another. Caught poorly prepared, the people of York were thrown into panic. French privateers were again, and in greater force, raiding off the entire New England coast, concentrating on an effort to starve the settlers by destroy- ing the small boats of the fishermen and intercepting vessels from Massachusetts loaded with supplies for beleaguered towns. Fami- lies abandoned their homes and took shelter behind the stockades; indeed the General Court ordered such concentrations in 1706, designating the exact quarters in the particular garrisons allotted to each family. By day men might venture forth a short distance
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and work, but at night they were obliged to return, like horses to their stalls, or be liable to a five-shilling fine, as if the threat of torture or violent death were not enough.
The selectmen were in despair. Upon them fell the respon- sibility to provide food for the billeted soldiers, to find money, fat cattle, corn, and clothing, when demanded, as the town's share of the taxes for the general military expense, as well as to find salary and supplies for the minister and for the new school- master, Nathaniel Freeman, who was first engaged shortly before the outbreak of the war. On the occasion of each new demand from Massachusetts, the selectmen sent petitions praying that taxes be abated and that food and clothing be sought elsewhere.
The petition of 1703, by the York selectmen to Governor Dudley and Council, well outlines the situation :
Our Land at prsent doth come Short of Producing our bread Corne. Our Mills a wholly useless, we are taken off from our Imployemts, have lost much Corne and Hey in our remote Skirts this Summer, We have borne almost an Equal Share with Pressed Soldiers, in Watching and Ward- ing. And Wee have Lost every Way in runing the hazard of Venturing to our ungarisond houses: our Stocks left, are our Chief Livelyhood, and if you take away them we shall not be able to subsist. .
These were the days when soldiers stood guard outside the church during Sunday services. In 1704 Lewis Bane, representa- tive from York, presented a petition in General Court praying, "if nothing may be Allowed from the Publick for their support, at least they may have Permission to Remove from their . hazardous Post . . . and Seek their Safety and Support in . . other Parts ... ". Several times funds were asked-and granted- for the support of the minister. In 1705 the representatives from York and Wells petitioned the Court-successfully-in behalf of those who were forced to live in garrisons seeking permission to use adjacent land for pastures and war gardens. Many years later, in depositions taken in a case before the Supreme Judicial Court, several elderly citizens recalled that the land around the church and adjoining the town hall was fenced in "to plant in ye wartime".
The war dragged on for ten weary years, but the people grew bolder and more ambitious as time passed. Unless some were not recorded, there were longer periods between raids than one might have expected. York escaped the first and greatest one
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A History of York, Maine
when, in August 1703, the enemy attacked simultaneously the settlements from Casco to Wells. Kittery and that part of York which lies adjacent to it suffered a raid in 1705, and in the next August Cape Neddick was invaded and four of John Stover's boys taken. Two years later, on August 10, 1707, Elias Weare was slain. There were two attacks in 1710, by all accounts, and in 1711 two men were killed near Scotland garrison. Late that same year a fishing sloop belonging to Captain Abraham Preble was stolen out of York Harbor by a Frenchman and three Indians, but the boat was recovered and the thieves put to death. On April 21, 1712, Samuel Webber, attacked somewhere between Cape Neddick and the center of York, escaped, although his horse received three wounds. In that same month a force of about twenty soldiers from the Harbor garrison, answering a call for aid from Cape Neddick, engaged a greater number of Indians and were obliged to fight a retreating battle, losing the sergeant, killed, and seven taken prisoner, to the ruins of the Stover garri- son where a relief from town came to their rescue.
In May, Olive Plaisted, daughter of James and Mary (Rishworth ) Plaisted, was carried off. She was redeemed by her mother at a cost of three pounds, eighteen shillings, and returned to York by Captain Samuel Jordan, an interpreter, whom she later married.
In September, thirty Indians attacked at Cape Neddick, killing John Spencer and wounding Dependence Stover as they were mowing, and destroying some forty head of cattle.
Yet, through it all, in spite of poverty and the dangers of war, the people of York worked to improve their standard of living. To provide education for the children, they had engaged Nathaniel Freeman as their teacher, in 1701, and a few years later built a schoolhouse. Accepting wholeheartedly the youthful Reverend Samuel Moody as their leader, they strove to make him comfortable and contented. A suggestion from him was to them a command. When, as army chaplain in 1698, he had answered within a year their call to be the town's minister, they had built a new parsonage for him at a cost of twenty pounds, and in 1701 built a barn. No contract was drawn up, he made no demands for a salary, saying that he would be satisfied with whatever the people could provide, and they always supplied his needs, even though at times they were obliged to apply to the General Court for aid. In 1708 the town voted ten pounds to build a study near the garrison for Father Moody.
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Faced with the need, as the shire town, of a larger place of assembly not only for religious services but also for use as county courthouse and headquarters for the county troops, York voted in the May 1711 town meeting to build a new church fifty feet square on Scituate Men's Row, where the present church stands, to replace the church built in 1667 near Meeting House Creek. The old church building, after all that was still usable had been removed and made part of the new structure, was, in 1712, sold to Nicholas Sewall. In 1714, after a new parsonage near the church had been completed, the house on the Lindsay Road built in 1699 for Mr. Moody was sold to William Grow.
The Treaty of Utrecht, signed in 1713, brought a cessation to hostilities in America as in Europe, and York was to enjoy ten years' freedom from declared war, though there was always, dur- ing these years, the possible danger that high-spirited young Indians might stage independent raids of their own. But as has already been stated, there had been some projects begun by the heads of families lodged in garrisons several years before there was peace, and in consequence a number of new dwellings- their greatest need-had been built, and damaged houses recon- structed with consideration for the prospect that they might become garrisons at some future time. Defense against hostile invaders must be prepared, and provision must be made for the possibility that neighbors might be driven from their homes or might willingly join forces behind a single barricade the better to repel a common foe. In 1711 the governor of Massachusetts ordered a list prepared of all the houses which would be suitable for garrisons. York reported twenty-one of them, capable of hous- ing "30 souldiers and 548 souls".
The full report, which is worthy of a close study, may be seen in the Massachusetts Archives LXXI, 871-76. The prepara- tions for the defense of each section of York indicate the distribu- tion of families and the growth of the population during twenty years after the Massacre. Cape Neddick apparenty had no garrison at the time of the survey, but the statement that "Peter Nowell has Liberty to erect one", capable of accommodating eight families with eight fighting men in them, and room for four "souldiers"- in all "45 souls"-shows that that part of town was receiving due attention. It is not known when, where, or if, Peter Nowell ever built this garrison. "A new one to be Erected between Cape Neddick and the Town being much for the Security of the Town" was probably built near "the Little River that flows by Stephen
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A History of York, Maine
Preble's door" on Long Sands Road, for one of his fields has always been known as Garrison House Field.
At Lower Town, Samuel Donnell was able to house six families and two soldiers-for a total of twenty-six souls-across from the road leading to Stage Neck. Honorable Jeremiah Moul- ton, who had bought the Alcock garrison property in 1694, could look after three families and two soldiers for a total of twenty- four; Captain Abraham Preble (son of Nathaniel and grandson of Abraham), in his brand new house overlooking the Market Place, could take care of only two families and a soldier, or thirteen in all; while Samuel Black, near by, could shelter twenty.
The defenses for the Village were Reverend Samuel Moody's parsonage, three families, two soldiers, fifteen in all; Captain Harmon's garrison, across Meeting House Creek from Father Moody's, five families, two soldiers, thirty souls. Esquire Abraham Preble's garrison on the Scituate Men's Row, which had with- stood the Massacre, eight families, four soldiers, to a total of sixty-four, was "The Store House" as well; Thomas Adams's garrison, on what is now Organug Road, stood ready for six families, one soldier-forty-two in all.
At York Corner Andrew Brown could shelter the neighbors to the extent of four families, one soldier, or twenty-two souls.
Cider Hill was well provided for; Mr. Plaisted and Captain Pickering each had a fortfied house because they had families of mill workers to protect on New Mill Creek, and in the hollow near by Joseph Moulton had room for three families. On top of Garrison Hill, Samuel Came, and farther to the west, Ensign Bragdon, each had a garrison. Farther on, in Scotland, stood the McIntire garrison for seven families and one soldier, or thirty-five souls. Still farther on towards South Berwick, in Brixham, a Mr. Penton, or Payneton, had shelter for twenty souls including two soldiers.
On the south side of York River, Edward Beale's garrison was expected to defend the dwellers near the river's mouth with the assistance of Mr. Raynes's garrison farther inland near Brave Boat Harbor, in Seabury; Joseph Main had only ten souls to care for on the hill above the present Rice's Bridge; and upstream, at Old Mill Creek, Allen's garrison was prepared to house four families or twenty souls from Beech Ridge. No soldiers were allotted to any South Side garrison, nor to Samuel Came's garrison built in 1710 on Cider Hill.
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10
In York, as in other New England towns, this was a period not only of repairing damaged houses and building new ones, of searching out favorable millsites and making use of them, but also of laying out and making new roads into the woods to make them accessible, of building wharves, warehouses, and lumber yards where planks and boards could be stacked, and new dwell- ings near them for workmen. Establishing new mills and creating millponds in the virgin forest was of little avail until there were ways to get to them with teams and wagons. This was pioneering all over again, but at this time there were no merchants to supply them with the needed mill machinery or to pay the wages of the workmen. The venturers-singly or in partnerships of several men-were obliged at their own risk to borrow money where they could find it, and there was little available for investment in Maine. Again Massachusetts provided assistance by creating in 1716 the first "Reconstruction Finance Corporation" in Ameri- can history by "An Act of ye Great & Gen'l Court of ye sd Province Intituled 'an act for the makeing and Emitting ye sum of One hundred thousand pounds in Bills of Credit on this Province' ".
To serve the needs of York, five men of Essex County were appointed commissioners to take mortgages and extend credit on good security or other evidence of a suitable business risk. At a session held at Salem, Massachusetts, February 13, 1716/17, they granted "Bills of Credit on this Province to men of York in the following amounts: Jeremiah Moulton 200£, James Carr 175£, Caleb Preble 250£, Samuel Webber 80£, John Wood- bridge 125£, Joseph Smith 30£, James Smith 27£, James Grant 65£". These loans, all secured against mortgages on real estate, were for terms of ten years from February 23, 1716. Interest charges were to be "after ye rate of five pounds p Cent p annum". A certain amount was specified to be paid off on the "principle" each year, but in stating the payment for the tenth year, the debtor was apparently shown further leniency by the clause that on the tenth anniversary he was to repay the full amount of the loan plus the annual five per cent interest "unless principle and Interest be paid and satisfied before". Furthermore, a grace period of sixty days after February 13, 1726, was specified in each mortgage, but the records show no foreclosures even though pro- ceedings against one debtor were instigated as late as 1747.
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A History of York, Maine
In 1718, when a new issue of sixty thousand pounds was voted, a new set of commissioners, all York County men, was appointed. They held a session on May 7, 1718, and granted loans under the same terms and conditions; in almost every in- stance, however, for smaller amounts.
In 1721 the Great and General Court voted a new issue of fifty thousand pounds in bills of credit against Massachusetts, this time under a new set of rules. By the new plan, an allotment was specified for each town. York was allowed to loan small sums up to a total of three hundred and sixty pounds. The selectmen Samuel Came and Richard Milbury were appointed to manage this fund in behalf of the town and be responsible to the General Court. A board of trustees was created-Joseph Sayward, Arthur Bragdon Sr., John Harmon, Thomas Haines, Joseph Moulton, Samuel Sewall, Jonathan Bane, and Joseph Bragdon-who were required to give bond for twice the amount of the town's allot- ment. The interest rate was five per cent as usual, of which four per cent was to be turned over to the town, and the remaining one per cent was to be a sort of payment to be divided among the trustees "for their trouble".
There is every reason to believe that. this plan was also successful, for in 1730 it was voted in town meeting "that the Interest of the 50,000 pounds & the 60,000 pounds be reserved in Bank & employed towards purchasing Corn when cheap to supply the poor and such others of the inhabitants as may for their own use at reasonable rates".
Again the town had reason to be grateful that Massachu- setts had usurped control in 1652.
During such strenuous times, when wolves roamed in packs to harass the flocks and even the people, when diphtheria carried off many young boys and girls, when new industries were bravely begun, when new families were settling in town, when young men of York were in military training or on the march during campaigns in defense of distant settlements, when strange young men were stationed here as soldiers in garrisons and in private homes where living conditions were already strained by the con- centration of families under a common roof, a strong leader was required. York had such a leader in their pastor, the Reverend Samuel, affectionately called Father, Moody. Tales of his eccen- tricities have often been told and there seems little to be gained in recounting them here. But rarely has it been emphasized that he was exactly the right man for the times.
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His absolute self-confidence gained him unquestioned con- trol, and his imperious leadership allowed no opposition. Over such strong men among the new leaders as Jeremiah Moulton, Johnson Harmon, Lewis Bane, Captain Arthur Bragdon, Samuel and Nicholas Sewall, Captain Nathaniel Donnell, Colonel Na- thaniel Donnell, and others of equal worth, no one could have assumed leadership as well as one who by his very position as a pastor was not in competition with the military and commercial interests of the town.
A year or two before 1720 reports began to come from the Kennebec region that bands of Indians were marauding again, attacking forts, seizing vessels, and raiding farms, thus breaking the existing peace treaty. "We are Well Assured" wrote the select- men of the four southern towns in a report from York, August 10, 1720,
that ye Indians have a Design to make a Warr upon us or at least to Drive of ye Inhabitants & make themselves Masters of that Country-What confirms us in our Oppinion is that ye Indians have been lately & Are Now Lurking About ye Out habitations of York Kittery Wells and Berwick in ye Night time & Are not Willing to be discovered. .
Captn Preble & Captn Harmon will Wait on yo' Excy and will Inform more fully-
We do therefore Humbly pray that yor Excy will be pleased so far to Consider our present Circumstances that those remote Setlemts may be covered. And that yor Excy would be pleased to Order ye Inhabitants through this County to be in Some posture of Defence by Erecting Garrisons or places of refuge and Seting up Watches &c as Need requires.
The Bay Colony went into action. This time it was an American war; that is, there was no war declared between Eng- land and France for which this land constituted the American battlefield. And this time it was the white race which declared open war upon the red men. Massachusetts at last was on the offensive.
The General Court voted to raise an army of a thousand men for the District of Maine; one hundred were stationed in York, a hundred and fifty were assigned to forts in Wells, Arundel, and Kennebunk, and garrisons in other Maine settlements were proportionately manned. The commanding officer of the regiment, Colonel Thomas Westbrook of Portsmouth, New Hampshire (for whom the town of Westbrook, Maine, was later named) set up his headquarters in York. The principal officers, York men who
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A History of York, Maine
had won high esteem as Indian fighters, received their commis- sions on their records as scouts and woodsmen with many years of experience in patrolling the forests.
Captain Johnson Harmon (1675-1751), son of John and Deborah (Johnson) Harmon was the ranking captain. Jeremiah Moulton (1688-1765), son of Joseph and Hanneth (Littlefield) Moulton, who as a small boy of four had seen his father and mother slain in the Massacre of 1692, had been a sergeant under Colonel John Wheelwright of Wells and a lieutenant in the early days of this war, was promoted in the field to captain in 1723. Captain Lewis Bane (1697-1743), son of Lewis and Mary (Aus- tin) Sayward Bane, commanded a third company.
The strategy for this war was to attack the enemy at the source instead of keeping small bands of scouts and "snowshoe men" roving in the woods to disperse advancing Indians, who usually were clever enough to break through and fall upon the weakly defended garrisons. It had taken nearly fifty years for New Englanders to learn that attack was the best defense. The first objective was to destroy Norridgewock, the largest settlement of the Indians, which lay in a region under French control, with a Jesuit priest, Sebastian Ralle, in charge as a missionary. It was believed, and later proved, that Father Ralle, induced by the governor of Canada, did his utmost to fire his Indian parishioners with murderous hatred for all Englishmen. Further progress of the war depended upon the capture of this leader and the degree to which the effectiveness of his forces would be smashed.
In December 1723 Captain Jeremiah Moulton led an expedition of at least two companies against the settlement. Ap- parently Ralle had received warning of their coming, for Captain Moulton found the village abandoned. Papers were confiscated which gave conclusive evidence that all the renewal of violence and torture by the Indians was the result of the hatred inspired in them by the French.
The following August, Captain Johnson Harmon was or- dered to carry out another expedition with a much larger force. Two hundred and five men were divided into four companies, under Captains Harmon, Moulton, Bane (Bean), and John Bourne, the latter being an officer from Massachusetts in com- mand of thirty Mohawks, friendly Indians from Barnstable County. Among the lieutenants were men of York who had already won respect in dealings with Indians: Lieutenant Moses Banks, noted woodsman and interpreter; Lieutenant Richard Jaques,
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son-in-law of Captain Johnson Harmon, respected for his boldness on the march. Most of the soldiers were from York.
The expedition was highly successful; Norridgewock was destroyed and about a hundred Indians were killed and a few taken prisoner. But the plan to capture Father Ralle and bring him to trial in open court in order to show the Indians that they had been duped by the French into going on the warpath was frustrated. Lieutenant Richard Jaques and his men broke down the door of Ralle's house and found him reloading his gun, shout- ing defiance to the English. Lieutenant Jaques personally shot him dead, but was afterwards rebuked for his action by his imme- diate superior, Captain Jeremiah Moulton.
Johnson Harmon (promoted to Colonel after Norridge- wock) and his son-in-law Lieutenant Richard Jaques moved their families from York to Harpswell in 1727. A few years later, after Lieutenant Jaques was killed by Indians there, Colonel Harmon returned the families to York.
In his report to the General Court of the siege of Norridge- wock Captain Harmon stated "We took alive, 4 Indians, viz one Woman and three Children, which are brought with us". It would be interesting to learn what became of these Indians after they were brought to York. Could there have been some connec- tion between them and the Indian servant Boneto to whom Elder Joseph Sayward promised freedom in a deed in 1730? In York Deeds, Book XIV, Folio 12, is found :
Elder Sayward to Boneto-Manumission
Know all men by these Presents that I, Joseph Say- ward of York ... for divers good Causes & Considerations moving me thereunto have covenanted and granted . . . to and with my Indian Servant Man Boneto whom I purchased of Thomas Pickerin for Life That if He the said Boneto shall well and truly serve me . .. for and during the Term of Nine [years & an Half] from the Date hereof ... and behave himself honestly, faithfully soberly & temporately as a Ser- vant ought to do during the sd Term that then at the Ex- piration of the sd Term he the sd Boneto shall be & hereby is discharged and set free clearly and absolutely of & from the Service of me. . .
And the Indian woman who was hung at Stage Neck for murder in 1735: Could she have been one of the Norridgewock captives?
These are the only Indians mentioned as dwellers in York. Edward E. Bourne told of several Indians and their habitations
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in Wells close by the homes of settlers; from Berwick and other York County towns come similar. tales. The conclusion drawn is that Indians did not dare to live in York after the plague of 1616.
The destruction of Norridgewock marked the turning point in warfare with Indians. The people of York, relaxing the caution that had been practised for the past thirty years, went freely into the woods, alone or in small parties, without the guards and sentries which formerly had been indispensable. The presence of the headquarters troops stationed in the town added to the feeling of security, but Colonel Westbrook, in exasperation, wrote: "The people generally preach up peace to themselves, if the Indians do not knock somebody in the head in Six or Seven Days". Though raids in isolated parts of other towns farther inland were reported, York was not molested. A year later, in 1725, this war came to an end after the Indians were disastrously defeated at Fryeburg. Warfare by Indians in force was over. A few Indians might fight as volunteers in French forces, but henceforth the foe was the French.
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