USA > Maine > York County > York > New England miniature; a history of York, Maine > Part 7
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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
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During this war there had been no slackening of the pace of development. Mills had been built on every stream, even on some brooks so small that the wheels could be turned only for a month or two or so long as the gatherings of winter runoff water were sufficient to furnish power. Since 1700 Samuel Webber and his sons had owned mills on Cape Neddick River, Samuel Brag- don at Bass Cove, Samuel Donnell and Francis Raynes at Rogers Cove, Deacon Thomas Bragdon at Cape Neddick Pond, and Samuel Came in the marshes near the present Birch Hill Road. A few years later six men of York were partners in a mill on Josias River, while at New Mill Creek the Pickering mills were sawing out boards where first Webb and Clark, later Henry Say- ward, had been in business. Peter Nowell and his many sons had mills at Bell Marsh. At newly-created Scituate Pond, Bragdons and Prebles carried on as partners.
In 1726 Elder Joseph Sayward formed a company of nineteen York men who constructed a dam across the mouth of Meeting House Creek and built and operated a sawmill and a gristmill.
These activities created employment not only at the mills but for building roads into wild lands to service them. New settlers attracted to towns required space on which to build homes and
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roads by which to reach them. The need for the land which had been held in common by the town since 1652 was growing, and the time had come to face in town meeting this issue: Should strangers be given first choice of the town's commonage or did the old settlers and their heirs, those who had suffered and sacri- ficed that there might be land to be given away, have prior rights in the division?
From earliest times young men had been encouraged to apply to the town for grants of free land with the understanding that they would settle on it, but after the Massacre the need for skilled workmen in the essential trades was so great that the select- men made the condition in deeds in such words as appear in a grant of parsonage land next to the pound on Lindsay Road to Nicholas Sewall that "so long as the said Sewall doth himself (or his heirs) carrie on the Trade of Taning of Leather in said place and no longer". The town also reserved common use of the spring which made the land desirable for use as a tannery.
In 1732 the town gave serious consideration to a plan, agreed upon in 1699, to divide and allot some of the public lands heretofore held as commonage. Article 5 of the town meeting of 1699 had been acted upon in this manner:
It is voted and confirmed By us the freeholders and other prinsubble Inhabitance Belonging to the Aboveced town of York: that all the Land Lying and Being and is Bounded as followeth: which is not already Granted and Layd out within the Space of one year after this date: shall Be reserved, cept and Confirmed as and for commonage for the uses of sd town: upon the Southwest sid Bounded upon the heads of the Lotts Setteld; upon the Northeast Side of York River, and to Beginn upon the Southwest Corner of the rockey Ground, and then to run upon a Northeast Line to Cape Nedick river; and from thence as the river runs up to the head of said pond of it, runs upon the Southwest Side, and from thence North West to Bell Marsh Brook: and so as the Brook runs down to the head of the North East Branch of York River &c/.
All of which is fairly clear after it is explained that the "South- west Corner of the rockey Ground" may be accepted as some point on the west side of U.S. 1 where the first ledges appear north of the Little River, in the neighborhood of Post or Nason Road.
The decision in 1732 as to how the lots were to be appor- tioned was not so simple. There were three groups to be accom-
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modated: First there were the old settlers, who constituted the majority of the voters; next there were the young men of marriage- able age who had grown up in town, and finally there were the strangers who had been invited to become citizens. The final decision was to lay out the land in shares of which no man should receive more than eight. The moderator was to read the names of citizens and as each name was called, three men acting as monitors should confer briefly and then propose the number of shares proper for each man to receive, whereupon the voters would concur or arrive at some other decision. The young men were each allotted two shares if they were "such young men as were born in this Town, are more than Twenty one years of age, now live in the Town, & have paid Rates in the Town and have had no share granted to them before". In 1732 only the Stated, or Inner, Commons were parceled out, but provision was made for a second dividend to be distributed twenty years later. This tract was to be known as the Outer Commons, and those-or their heirs and assigns-who received shares in 1732 were to receive at some future date an equal number of shares in the Outer Commons, when issued. Actually the second division oc- curred in 1750. The original shareholders, incorporated into an organization known as the Proprietors of the Common Lands, had the actual management and distribution of the lots until the last one was surveyed and a proper deed for it was given at the final recorded meeting, held on August 15, 1820.
In 1755 a committee of the Proprietors who had been given power, by vote in the regular meeting of January 10, 1748, to dispose of "all such pieces strips and gores of land as are left out of the Division of the Stated Commons so-called, and not therein included", sold to Nathaniel Donnell Jr. all that re- mained of Sentry Hill. The common lands were now all in private possession.
The surveying of the wild and wooded land, laying it out in lots with definite bounds and giving it free, most of it as divi- dends to those who had already settled homesteads near populated sections of the town, and some of it to newcomers who expressed a desire to become citizens, brought about a redistribution of the town's population. At once, in 1732 and again in 1750, there was an active market for these allotments at a stable price of four pounds per share. Years passed before surveyors finished the task of setting the corner posts on the last of the lots, and as time went by they were more often employed by heirs of the original grantees
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and even by the sons of the heirs. In such cases the surveyors had double duties: they were called upon not only to locate two or five or eight shares but were expected to divide those shares "in equal quality and quantity" among several heirs who were cous- ins. They had a simpler task when an original owner of a grant gave a specific share or shares to a son about to marry and estab- lish a new homestead.
Thus it came about that Lewises, Blaisdells and Traftons from Beech Ridge, Ramsdells and Welches from Brixham, Plais- teds, Junkinses, Prebles, Bracys and Moultons from Cider Hill and Scotland settled at Mount Agamenticus and Clay Hill or Ground Nut Hill on land given to fathers or grandfathers, while Fitzgeralds, fresh from Ireland, bought their shares in open mar- ket. And so to Cape Neddick and its environs came the Matthews from Isles of Shoals, and Hutchinses, Nortons, Wilsons, Haleys, and Chases from Spruce Creek in Kittery, while Winns spread over the Ogunquit line to found North Village.
Before the invasion of summer visitors made living near the ocean more profitable, there were more families living to the west of U.S. 1 than to the east. Families were raised and educated in settlements on Linscott Road in Brixham, at New Boston be- hind Scotland, at Newtown between U.S. 1 and Chases Pond Road, which were thriving then but are now well-nigh inacces- sible, and some of them uninhabited.
One prominent citizen to whom the full allotment of eight shares was granted received also a noteworthy extra dividend. In 1732 Elder Joseph Sayward, grandson of Henry Sayward, the mill operator and builder of the second church, and father of the noted Jonathan Sayward, was Father Moody's most active and valuable assistant, and working together, the two men endeared themselves to the townspeople to an extent which has had no parallel. Whether he was a poor businessman, whether, as a prime mover and heaviest investor in the corporation which cre- ated Barrell Mill Pond in 1726 and operated mills there, he tied up his working capital, or whether he gave too freely of his time to public service, is not clearly shown, but Elder Sayward became hopelessly involved in debt by 1731. However the good people of York came to his rescue. Probably on a suggestion by Father Moody, they voted unanimously in town meeting to sell whatever common land the town held at Cape Neck and to apply the pro- ceeds "towards Compounding with the sd Saywards Creditors & paying the just debts .". To carry out this vote one hundred
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acres at Cape Neck were sold to Richard Milbury, Abraham Bow- den, Benjamin Stone, Abiel Goodwin, Samuel Milbury, and John Milbury, and four hundred and seventy pounds were realized from the sale. Such concerted action by a town for one of its citizens was rare indeed in the eighteenth century and is even rarer today.
Of still greater importance than the distribution of common lands was the separation of the church from the town. In 1731 the First Parish was formed, marking a radical change in the life of this New England community. Up to this time the manage- ment of the church property had been controlled by the town. All citizens were members of the church and could be penalized by law for absence from Sunday services. As owners of the church, the town used the building-the only one which was large enough for public gatherings-on weekdays for town and county business, as a town hall and as a courthouse.
Distance and bad traveling conditions made regular attend- ance at church difficult for the growing population living as far from the church at the Village as Beech Ridge, Scotland, or Cider Hill. As early as 1718, mounting protest was given consideration in town meeting when it was "Voted that the Inhabitance above the Mill Creek have Liberty to build a Meeting house if they will build it upon there on Cost and Charge". Several years passed before the meeting house was built in Scotland on land which Alexander Maxwell had bequeathed, half to the existing church, half to Father Moody. There is reference in 1722 to "the new Meeting house"; Father Moody's son Joseph entered into his diary on February 29, 1724, "We met the first time in the new Meet- ing house at Scotland"; the structure was still unfinished in 1727 when the town voted forty pounds to complete it; Joseph Moody was ordained pastor in 1732.
A considerable number of townspeople having transferred their membership to the new church, it was no longer appropriate to allow all of the citizens to vote on the conduct of the affairs of the first church. Hence the formation of a new organization to have control of the real property, separate from the membership charged with the conduct of religious affairs. The town and the county, being now obliged to obtain the permission of the parish for use of the church for civilian affairs, voted in 1733 to build a courthouse, each to share equally in the expense, and each to appoint a committee to work together for its construction. Before the close of 1735 the building was completed and in use for a
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parish meeting. Thus the situation was reversed; church affairs were decided in a municipal building. The people no longer at- tended town meetings, murder trials, slander suits, or acrimonious boundary disputes on weekdays in the same building in which they worshipped on Sundays.
The products of the several new saw and gristmills in- creased beyond the needs of the town; York had surplus to export. More and larger wharves and warehouses were built and more vessels larger than fishermen's ketches were required. Most of the few trading vessels which had been owned in York had been built and launched at the Piscataqua River. John Davis, York's first mer- chant, and John Penniwell had owned small vessels before war with the Indians had broken out. Samuel Banks had built a brig- antine in 1685 at Cape Neddick. George Norton, though he dwelt at York, had a shipyard at the Piscataqua; Captain Francis Raynes built ships at Braveboat Harbor. Shipbuilding at York River was certainly begun by 1732, when the sloop The Marys, sixty tons, was built, and possibly earlier. By 1734 Nathaniel Donnell Jr., owner of one or more vessels, was established in successful trade between York and Annapolis Royal in Nova Scotia, where his brother Samuel, as his agent, had taken residence and the brothers had received grants of thousands of acres of land. Their cousin, Captain Nathaniel Donnell, Sr., was gradually cutting his ties in York and associating himself with the development of Bath and the shipbuilding there.
The people of York continued to do most of their trading directly with the merchants at the wharves and warehouses along York River, chiefly at the Market Place. In 1714 Mrs. Phoebe (Royal) Tanner, the first shopkeeper, opened a small retail store in her new house on Scituate Men's Row next to the site of the present library.
Possibly a few voyages ranged as far as the West Indies by 1740, thereby entering into competition with the Boston mer- chants who had been so engaged for the previous hundred years, but probably the York traders were still content, for two more decades, with commerce in coastal ports between Nova Scotia and Georgia.
By 1742 the population on the south side of York River had increased to the extent that there was a demand for a better way than by Samuel Sewall's ferry for the families in that vicinity to get across the York River, particularly in order to get to church on Sundays. In that year it was voted in town meeting to allow
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any combination of private persons to build a bridge in the vicinity of Sewall's Ferry, but at no expense to the town and with the stipulation that citizens of York could cross "the same without anything to pay". The bridge was not opened to traffic until 1761, but in the years between, there was general faith that there surely would be a bridge some day, and on the strength of that belief the town voted in 1744 to lay out and build what was named, about one hundred and fifty years later, Lindsay Road, the new part extending from the bridge at Meeting House Creek over the hill to Thomas Donnell's wharf, known now as John Hancock's Wharf.
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For fifteen years after Norridgewock the people of Maine continued to improve their towns and their personal incomes, with little or no interference from Indians. Prospects of any new wars seemed remote; the civilians could build while a few military men could watch for trouble. The truckhouses in the forts down east nearest the French settlements served as barometers for possi- ble war clouds. In times of peace the trading Indians were friendly and uncomplaining in their relations with the officers in the forts, but as soon as the red men were being incited to hostilities against the English they would become surly at the posts, prolonging dis- putes over trivial complaints, or even making threats. Truck- masters would report these incidents at once to the Massachusetts governor, and soon all of New England would be alerted. There were times when New England authorities learned from the Indians in the woods of Maine, who had been given the news by the French missionaries from Canada, of the imminence of war in Europe before the Massachusetts governor had received official notice from England.
Signs of Indian discontent began to appear in 1739 and shortly afterwards there came report of the outbreak of war be- tween England and Spain. Since the Spanish fleet at that time was considered the most powerful of all navies, the fear grew that the Atlantic Coast might be attacked. In Maine, William Pepperrell Jr., colonel of the York militia in command of all the forces from the Piscataqua to the border of Quebec, called the officers to a meeting in Falmouth to discuss plans for re- organizing, enlarging, and equipping the army, and for improving the discipline. Vacancies in the four existing companies were filled, and supplies were laid in. A new regiment was formed out
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of unattached companies in forts and towns eastward from Fal- mouth, and Samuel Waldo was given command. The Spanish threat did not affect Maine, however, and a new treaty with Penobscot Indians was successfully concluded in 1742.
But in the next year, 1743, when report came of an immi- nent break between France and England, and warning of possible attack by a French fleet, Colonel Pepperrell instructed his captaine to prepare for action on short notice. In May 1744 the news ar- rived that France had declared war. French and Indian forces from Cape Breton Island destroyed the English settlement of Canso in Nova Scotia and a fleet threatened Annapolis Royal to the southward. In York there was fear of bombardment by the French fleet, of possible attack by a French landing party, and of course, of attack from the woods by forces of Frenchmen and Indians. A stockade with two flankers at diagonally opposite cor- ners was built around the parsonage on Scituate Men's Row.
There was good reason for anxiety in the settlements along the Atlantic Coast. For several years France had been erecting under great difficulty and at the cost of millions a fortress at Louisburg on Cape Breton Island that was said to be as nearly impregnable as any citadel that had been built anywhere in the world up to that time. From such a base a French fleet could raid at will.
A siege of Louisburg had been proposed seriously back in 1741 when the fort was in the early stages of construction. At that time the project had been considered bold but feasible if undertaken at the crown's expense with troops of the regular English army, supported by the English navy, with only incidental assistance from the colonies. In England the plan had been pigeon- holed, being rated impracticable and too expensive. The French attacks on Nova Scotia settlements, however, created a sense of urgency. In January 1745 the General Court, on the insistence of wealthy merchants and substantial citizens in Boston, voted to raise three thousand volunteers at once. This was rightly called a "project of wild audacity"-not because it was considered im- possible but because it was to be financed directly by the colonies and carried out by their untrained volunteer troops.
Happily the choice of commander was William Pepperrell, whose popularity and qualities of leadership were indispensable requisites in view of the jealousies and suspicions he was to en- counter, the tendency of raw troops to rebel against discipline, and the rivalry between soldiers and sailors from different colonies.
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The colonial army was to be supported by an English fleet com- manded by Commodore Peter Warren. Pepperrell was to be in charge of land operations; Warren on the sea.
The response to the call for three thousand volunteers was enthusiastic; within two months the army was equipped and ready. Half of the troops were from Maine and the rest were from Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Con- necticut. With extraordinary speed the volunteers were despatched to headquarters in Boston where they were put aboard vessels which left that port in a convoy late in March bound for Canso, where they arrived early in April. In the last days of the month, the expedition set forth for Cape Breton Island and made camp on the far side of the cape on which the Louisburg fortress stood, only a mile or two distant by land.
There was an almost incredible amount of preparatory work to be done-foraging for food and fuel, scouting in the woods for Indians, hauling, mostly by human hands, heavy war equipment into position. In the reports there is mention that Captain John Card of York, with fifty men, was detailed for a six-day scouting trip through the woods. On the sea, Colonel Jeremiah Moulton led a detachment of his regiment, who as marines on English warships, reconnoitered along the coast, and captured and destroyed the French settlement of St. Peters. With- in two weeks the direct attack on Louisburg was begun, with part of the troops attacking from inland, hauling cannons through wooded swamps and up rocky slopes ever higher and ever nearer to the walls; while from the sea side, other forces stormed a high, defended position across the harbor entrance from the fort, called the Island Battery. Soon both enterprises were successful, and both forces were able to rain shells down into the citadel from positions which were higher than the fortifications. With the interior a shambles, the French commander asked for terms and surrendered on June 17.
Much to the disappointment of the troops, no general plun- dering of Louisburg was allowed, for the fort was not overwhelmed during actual combat but was turned over to the victors in sub- mission to terms of a surrender agreement. Such plunder as was brought home by a few officers was acquired from French war- ships captured in the preliminary days, or from raids on coastal towns. Colonel Moulton received a silver tankard, which it is said Sir William had ordered a Boston silversmith to make from silver taken at Louisburg; Jonathan Sayward acquired china and
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furniture which probably came from some French ship. To the end of her days, Mary Bulman cherished a silver tankard which had been a part of the doctor's share.
On the next day General Pepperrell gave a victory dinner to his officers and to Commodore Warren and his captains. When Father Moody was called upon to say grace, there was anxiety felt lest he would make one of his customary hour-long prayers, but they were agreeably surprised to hear him say, "Good Lord, we have so many things to thank Thee for that time will be infi- nitely too short to do it; we must therefore leave it as the work of eternity. Bless our food and our fellowship on this joyful occasion for the sake of Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen".
And a "joyful occasion" it was, indeed, for the colonists. Everywhere in New England there was rejoicing, with church services and prayers of thanksgiving; with feasts, the ringing of bells, and the glare of bonfires; with salutes of cannons. This was to celebrate the greatest achievement of the colonists; they had pledged their lives and their hard-won possessions to the success of a plan of their own making, and had gained complete victory through the efforts of their own, untrained men. And in Maine there was a special sense of pride, for the leader was from their own province.
The town of York, too, could share in the pride and the rejoicing, for its men had been among the first to offer their ser- vices. General Pepperrell had sought first for volunteers among the soldiers of his regiment, and in York there were companies of men who had long been under his command. A letter which Dr. Alexander Bulman, York's leading doctor and William Pepper- rell's family physician, wrote to the General within a few days after the call for enlistments had reached York, clearly shows the mood of the times. Under date of February 4, 1745, he wrote:
. .. agreeable to the late proclamation this day the several companies of the town were called together, (except one), and there was considerable readiness in many to enlist; and as I was informed 17 of Capt. Harmon's snowshoe men have already entered their names enlisted. About ten or twelve have enlisted at large under any captain whom the Governor shall appoint. About ten more under Mr. James Donnell. And twelve of Capt. Sewell's company have signed a paper signifying their intention of enlisting, tho' desirous of first knowing who is likely to be their captain. . .. Your Honor will be pleased ... that the said Capt. Sewell called his men to his own house and generously entertained them all with a
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dinner and much encouraged them to engage in the present expedition, promising to as many of his men as would go that he would give them out of his own pocket so much as with the Province pay they should have 8£ per month. And that if any of their families were in want he would supply them so they should not suffer. .. .
Dr. Alexander Bulman (1702-1745) was personally as well known by the soldiers and by the citizens of York County as General Pepperrell. Born in Boston, he first appears in Maine records as surgeon under Colonel Thomas Westbrook in 1724, the year of the successful Norridgewock expedition, when he was mentioned as "having his hands full at [Forts] Richmond & Arrow- sick" and could not be spared to consult with doctors at Falmouth in their emergency. Attending both civilians and soldiers, his services were already in great demand from Biddeford to Bath. In 1727 the Town of York reached an agreement with him to be- come a resident and to practice his profession, voting "In Con- sideration of Dr. Allexander Bullman's Settlement in the Town there be raised & freely given unto sd Doctor Bullman the Sum of One Hundred Pounds: Provided he gives Security for his Continuance in the Town during Life".
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