USA > Maine > York County > Kittery > Old Kittery and her families > Part 7
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administrator of his estate and sold forty acres to Nicholas Walden in 1699, which Walden sold back to Woodman at once. Here Woodman lived and kept the ferry "from Withers point to Strawberry banke." The town records say that "John Woodman presenting his request to the Selectmen and others the inhabitants of this Town, for their approbation for his keep- ing a Ferry from Kittery to Strawberry Bank, as it was granted to him by the Court in the year 1692, which is granted by the town and voted accordingly by the Majr parte thereof." In connection with this the following record is of interest. "The town receiving a Citation from the General Court on the Petition of John Langdon to have a bridge from his Island to Kittery and to keep a Ferry from said Island to Portsmouth, May 12, 1792, the town voted an answer to said Citation, that in 1692 the County Court granted to John Woodman and his heirs and assigns the Privilege of keeping a Ferry from Kittery to Portsmouth and that in 1699 the town of Kittery gave their approbation and grant to said Woodman in like manner. and said Ferry had been in their possession to the present time as their Property in fee simple and that the town are of opinion that to take it from them without compensation would be unconstitutional." When the bridge to Portsmouth was built, about 1828, some compensation was allowed to the heirs of John Woodman. Woodman sold his house and ferry to his son-in-law, John More, in 1724.
Next northwesterly to Diamond's was the grant of four hundred acres from Gorges to Thomas Withers, 1 March 1643. It was bounded on the southeast side "with a Cricke & burnt tree," and also on the "Nore west side with a Cricke and burnt tree." Withers received at the same time two islands south and southwest of his grant, containing by estimation two hundred and eighty acres. The grant to Withers stretched away in a northeast direction towards Spruce Creek two hundred and seventy-six rods, till it met the land that was afterward granted to him at Eagle Point, on Spruce Creek. It was two hundred and forty rods in breadth. The northeast half fell to his son-in-law. Thomas Rice, and the other half to another son-in-law. John Shapleigh. Portions of Shapleigh's half were sold to the Rev. John Newmarch and to Shapleigh's
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brother-in-law, Stephen Eastwick. Rice's part remained among his descendants for many generations.
Thomas Withers came over with Mason's company in 1631. His wife's name was Jane. He was Deputy to General Court in 1656 and held town office frequently. The greatness of his land grants shows the estimation in which he was held. He held the offices of Councillor and Commissioner. His death occurred in March or April, 1685. His widow married William Godsoe in 1691 and was living in 1703. His daughter Sarah married John Shapleigh about 1673. Another daughter, Mary, born in 1660, married Thomas Rice about 1675, and a third daughter, Elizabeth, married first, 27 Nov. 1688, Benjamin Berry; and second, before 1702, Dodavah Curtis. Her two sons, Benjamin and Withers Berry, died unmarried. Thus the name Withers perished with the first settler but his descendants are many in the Shapleigh, Rice, and allied families.
The island granted to Thomas Withers in 1643 was divided between his daughters Mary and Elizabeth. Here Benjamin Berry lived for a short time and then it was called "Berry's Island." James Heard had a house-lot here in 1671. It has been called Langdon's Island and Badger's Island according to the name of its owner. The original name, Withers Island, ought to be applied to it, so as to preserve an ancient landmark and to commemorate one who had a very important part in the early history of Kittery.
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OLD KITTERY
VI. UP THE PASCATAQUA.
The last chapter left us at the northern limit of Thomas Withers' land, opposite Strawberry Bank. Robert Mendum was his next neighbor on the northwest. We have met him before at Kittery Point, where he built a new house in 1648 and
MENDUM'S COVE.
where, doubtless, he was licensed to keep an ordinary in 1644. He was constable in 1652 and Selectman in 1673. He had a grant of one hundred and forty acres in 1651. We have seen also that he owned land on the east side of Spruce Creek, though he never lived there. He died in 1682 and his son Jonathan inherited the homestead on the Pascataqua.
Next above Mendum the original settler was Jeremy Sheres. His surname is written also Sheires, Sheares, and Shores. He
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is first mentioned in 1649, when he rented for seven years a new house of Nicholas Frost. The contract was not fulfilled. Sheres and wife Susanna sold, 14 Nov. 1664, their one hundred acres which had been granted by the town, 3 March 1651, and moved to Cape Neddick in York, where he was living in 1680.1 The purchaser was Nathaniel Fryer of Portsmouth, who sold it to Christopher Adams, I March 1668. It was twenty-four rods in breadth by the water side and lay "between the Lands of Robert Mendum on the wester side and William Palmer on the Nother side." Christopher Adams signed a petition in Brain- tree in 1645 and is thought to have been a brother of Henry Adams, ancestor of the Presidents Adams. He was a mariner of Portsmouth at the time when he bought this place. His will made 13 June 1686 and probated 21 Sept. 1687, is recorded in Boston. The inventory included one hundred and twenty acres in his "plantation" and seventy acres bought of William Palmer and Peter Glanfield. A plot of his farm is on the town records. comprising all between Mendum's Creek and Mast Cove, 44 by 360 rods.
William Palmer was in Kittery as early as 1642. His daughter Sarah married William King, to whom Palmer gave sixteen acres at the eastern end of his lot, lying along "Mast Cove." Palmer gave. 21 April 1670, twelve acres to Peter Glanfield and entrusted to him his little daughter Rachel, then only three years and nine months old, to be brought up. The forty acres sold to Adams Lay at "Palmers Point." The Adams "plantation" thus comprised the point of land on which the Railway Station now is. Palmer move.1 to Cape Porpoise in 1675.
The lot occupied by Peter Glanfield was first granted to Joseph Alcock, son of John Alcock of York. He sold to Christopher Joyse and Edward Clark. Clark soon died and his widow, Mary, married John Smith, senior, of Cape Neddick. She was daughter of George Farrow of Ipswich, and was born 6 Jan. 1644-5. Samuel Knight soll the land to Glanfield in 1682. I have found no record of any descendants of Glanfield.
'The inventory of his estate was made in 1701. Mention is made of a son-in-law. John Green of Boston.
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OLD KITTERY
North of Glanfield was a lot owned by Thomas Spinney. His grant of two hundred acres lay on both sides of the "Great Cove," later called "Spinney's Cove." Though the grant was made in 1659, it is probable that he had been living here for some time.
Above Thomas Spinney, on the east side of Great Cove, was a lot of fifteen acres originally owned by Thomas Turner and mortgaged by him to George Walton of Portsmouth, 16 Aug. 1659. Probably the land was unimproved and therefore was regranted by the town to Richard Carle. He sold six acres of it to his son-in-law. Samuel Knight, in 1684. Knight sold this, and Carle sold all the rest of the original grant to Samuel Spinney in 1682 and 1693.
Then came Christian Remick's twenty acres, granted 17 July 1661, and laid out 22 Feb. 1665. He deeded this and other grants east of it to his son Isaac, who sold the same to John Dennet. Jr., 2 May 1698, and moved to South Carolina. Dennet added to his farm by purchase of Richard King's seventeen acres in 1700 and by town grants. This farm has been in the possession of the Dennet family until now. The house, built about the year 1720. stands "on the east side of the Eliot road about a mile above Portsmouth Bridge."
"The Remick of whom the farm was purchased resided in a house on the bank of the Creek west of the road, and opposite the Dennet house."1
In 1697 there was a dispute between Thomas Spinney and Christian Remick about their boundary line, and in consequence the accompanying plot of lands appears in the records of the Superior Court at Boston with the following statement :
"Kittery, December 18th, 1607. At the motion and Request of Mr. Thomas Spinney layd out the Norther bounds of his old lot in the great Cove as also his addition at the head thereof contain- ing fifteen acres, and in running out the aforesaid bounds as they were shewed to me by the sd Thomas Spinney and John Spinney I find the land in Controversie claimed by Mr Christian Remmick and Improved by Samll Spinney to fall within Mr Thomas Spin-
'Historic Homes of Kittery, by Mores A. Safford, Esq. Me. Hist. Coll. Vol. V .. 398.
~Wr The Spinners 15, agre lot at heard world let
Thomas Spinneys 15 acrelot at head of Alcock
Ric : King's lat
Christian Remick's addition to his old 20 nome lot of to pola back
containing 15acres
E. B N. the lawin Controversu
Head Turner y Wallen
Chris Remich 10 ucm Swamp land for meadow near I Hiltens
in Breadth Not S. 40 Pole
Highway
Hilton's lot
Sunous lot
W
R
Tho : Turner George Walton Rich? Carle S. Spinney
AS
Christian Remich 20 acre lot
Great Cove
EAST SIDE OF GREAT COVE, 1697.
Surveighr for the Town of Kittery."
By me William Godsoe
91
neys bounds of his fifteen acre lot as is demonstrated in the figure by a pricked line, the other lots being but demonstrations of the
AND HER FAMILIES
to me
.
for which I find no graut presented
Vacant land claimed ly Mr Romick
Sept . 5. 1671
Back side Turner & Walton confirmed
MY Thom. Spenny's Alcock's lot old lot !
Palmer's lot
Scituations of jacent places.
East be North + West be South
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OLD KITTERY
The plot is of interest as locating the old residence of Thomas Spinney, marked S, and also that of Isaac Remick, marked J. R.
The lot on the plan, marked "Simons lot," was granted to John Symonds, 17 Feb. 1661. It passed through the hands of Andrew Newcomb and William Hearle to the ownership of John Fernald, who lived on Eliot Neck. The lot of William Hilton, shown on the plan, was owned successively by John More, John Seward and James Fernald. The last lived here. The descrip- tions of the lots are confusing in the transfers, and it may be that the surveyor marked Symonds' lot as Hilton's and vice versa. All these lots on the east side of the Great Cove were forty rods in width and contained twenty acres.
Above James Fernald lived John Sloper in 1679, when he bought the lot of Stephen Paul, and above Sloper lived at the same date Richard Gowell. The land of Gowell was partly in what is now Eliot and partly in Kittery. A brook which is the dividing line between the towns ran through Gowell's land. He had only a few acres on the Cove, bought of Richard King in 1686. This was bounded on the south by the above mentioned brook. The rest of Gowell's land was his by grant of the town. His house was south of the town line and north of the brook.
Let us now return to the river lots. Thomas Spinney owned and lived on the extreme point of Eliot Neck. Near by lived his sons-in-law, John and Samuel Fernald. John Fernald bought of Widow Elizabeth Edwards, 1 March 1669, twelve acres near the Boiling Rock, which her husband. Stephen Edwards, had pur- chased of James Johnson, 7 April 1664.
Above Spinney and the Fernalds was a lot originally owned by John Alcock, son of the Joseph Alcock who has been men- tioned before. He sold it, 10 Aug. 1681, to Peter Dixon. This Alcock was a shipwright and is the one who married Joan Ameredeth. The fifteen acres are described in the deed as "nere ve boyling Rock having ye River of Piscataqua on ye Southwest side thereof and is bounded on ye South East with ye land of Thomas Spinney and on ye Northwest with ye land of Christian Remax and ve north East with ye land of the aforesaid Peter Dixon."
Christian Remick received his first grant before 1651. Addi- tional grants were made from time to time till he had two hundred
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and forty acres. He was a leading citizen, filling the offices of Surveyor, Treasurer and Selectman. His homestead on Eliot Neck was given to his son, Joshua. His house stood near the river, not far from the family burial ground. The graves of many of the earlier generations of Remicks are marked by unlet- tered headstones of rough granite, and close by a fitting memo- rial has been erected by Lieut. Oliver P. Remick, a descendant of the emigrant, Christian Remick.
CHRISTIAN REMICK
SOM OF JACONI
B
SMPENICOER CAL AUML SSUMER
PROPRIETOROF KISTEKE EMOT AND THE IFERWICK'S. SULEFT SAR SURVEYOR & LAID FIRST OWNER OF THUIS LANGLIVED TIENE OVER 60YEARS, AND WAS BURIED MERCI
---
JACOB REMICK HIS SON
PROPRIETOR, SECĂCTRAILTOWN TABAC
OLIVER P.REMUER
MONUMENT OF CHRISTIAN REMICK.
Next north of Remick was Gabriel Tetherly, who bought, I May 1660. twenty acres of Thomas Onyon, the same, probably, who was afterward killed by Indians in Portsmouth. Daniel King lived north of him in 1674. Tetherly's land came into the possession of his son-in-law and administrator, Richard King, who sold sixteen acres of it to his son, Richard King. The lat- ter sold. in 1716. a house lot of half an acre to John Scriggin. It was next to Remick's land and separated from the river and land- ing place by a road. Gabriel Tetherly had a shipyard here.
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OLD KITTERY
Next above Tetherly and King, on the river, the first settler known was John Andrews, who sold his house and lands to Daniel Paul and Bartholomew Smith, 21 March 1648, and moved to Braveboat Harbor. The deed mentions John Symonds on the north. The next year Paul bought a house and an acre of land of Richard Cutts, that had been owned and occupied by Stephen Sanborn, afterward of Hampton. It adjoined the land of Paul. His son, Stephen Paul, married a daughter of Antipas Maverick, who lived further up the river. Stephen inherited the home- stead. Daniel Paul was a shipbuilder. He is first mentioned as a "mariner," which usually meant the master of a vessel, in Bos- ton, 26 Aug. 1640. He declared himself from Ipswich, England, and gave a letter of attorney for the sale of lands in Ipswich and delivery of money to his wife, Elizabeth. He signed the submis- sion of 1652 and had grants in 1653 and 1665. The last was "in the great cove below ye Boiling Rock," and he sold it to John Sloper, 14 Feb. 1679.
It seems that a portion of the lot bought by Paul and Smyth got into the possession of Joseph Alcock, Paul's son-in-law, for he sold it in 1662 to Weymouth Lydston, fisherman, and Gilbert Lugg. Lugg's half of the purchase passed to Charles Nelson, and was bought of his heirs by John Lydston. The Lydstons long lived here.
In 1659 Daniel Paul and Elizabeth, his wife, mortgaged to Richard Cutt, 66 acres "above ye boiling rock between Gabriel Tetherly on the south and Joseph Alcock on the north."1
John Symonds came over with Mason's Company in 1634. He was in the employ of John Winter in 1636, and was appointed to lay out land in Kittery before 1652. Selectman in 1659. His farm on Eliot Neck was granted to him by the town. The name of his first wife is unknown. A daughter, Rebecca, married William Hilton, afterward of Exeter. He married for second wife. in 1668, Welthea, widow of John Goddard of Dover Neck and Oyster River. Goddard had come over in the same company with Symonds and died in 1660. It appears that Symonds after his second marriage lived in Dover .?
Symonds gave his homestead in Kittery to his son-in-law, Hilton, in 1667. He was probably son of Edward Hilton, the
1See deeds at Concord, N. H., II. 33.
"Sce Historicai Memoranda of Ancient Dover, p. 371.
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first settler at Dover Neck. He conveyed it to his son, Richard Hilton. 4 May 1684, except a house lot of three acres. It was described as land "formerly possessed and enjoyed by my father in Law John Simons being bounded . on the Northwest side with Mary Bachellors high way and on the Southeast side with Daniel Pauls high way," to run back from the river "till it comes
LONG REACH.
to a running brook that is ve head of it." This land passed into the hands of John Downing of Dover, who sold it, 23 Jan. 1699, to Joseph Hill of Kittery, formerly of Oyster River. Peter Staples was then living on the northeast and Charles Nelson on the southeast in part. It remained in the Hill family for many vears. Others lands of John Symonds, west of the Great Cove as we have seen, passed to the ownership of John Fernald.
Under date of 14 Feb. 1648 we read in the York Deeds, "Mrs. Batchellers Lot is bounded from the High Way betwixt George Rogers his Lot & hers to the Hie Way betwist John Simmons his Lot & Hers by the water Side & so up into ye woods backward to a little Brook of Water & to run thither upon a Northe East & by East Line." She was the third wife
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OLD KITTERY
of the Rev. Stephen Batcheller of Hampton. He had moved to Portsmouth in 1647 and took her, "an honest neighbor." as house-keeper. Soon after he married her, though he was about eighty-seven years of age, and in 1650 he was fined in the Court of Norfolk County for not publishing his marriage according to law. There is no evidence that he lived in Kittery, and he soon applied for a divorce, which was refused. He left America about 1655 and died near London in 1660, aged one hundred. She applied for divorce in 1657 and evidently obtained it, though there has been found no record of it. She seems to have been a widow at the time of her marriage and had two children. Mary Batcheller married Thomas Turner and. 4 July 1674. they sold their lot to Peter Staple. Turner made a deposition. 23 June 1683. aged then 73. His estate was administered in 1684. The lot was described as "Land formerly granted to my wife by Mr. Thomas Gorges & alsoe regranted & confirmed to her by the Town of Kittery." This may be a hint as to who she was.
May 20. 1641. Thomas Gorges authorized "Robert Beedle to seise on & make use of the lot between George Rogers & John Simons & I promise in time Convenient to Draw up his lease." Nothing more is known . of Robert Beedle, but the Town Records say that in 1679 ten acres were granted to Christopher Beedle which had been granted to his father Christopher Beedle in 1669. "at the head of the lot that was his grandfathers." Joseph Hill, who married Susanna, daughter of Christopher Beedle. Sen., relinquished all claim to this ten acre grant in favor of Peter Staples 20 March 1703-4. Chris- topher Beedle, Jr .. held the ten acre lot in 1693. and his estate was administered by Peter Staples, 13 Sept. 1708. It would appear from the above that the third wife of the Rev. Stephen Batcheller was Mary, widow of Robert Beedle, and that is why the town laid out to Mrs. Batcheller the lot which Gorges had given to Robert Beedle.1
Peter Staple had a grant in 1661. He married a widow, named Elizabeth. and died about 1719. leaving three sons. The farm remained long in the Staple family.
George Rogers was in the employ of John Winter at Rich- mond Island in 1639. He was living on his lot next north of 'York Deeds I. 5. Part. II., II and VII., 29.
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Beedle, afterward Staple, in 1641, and the lot was confirmed to him by the town in 1648. It was then bounded on the north by a highway and the lot of John Green. He was a juryman in 1650. There is no mention of him after 1654. Since Richard Rogers was living on this lot a few years later, it is concluded that he was the son of George. The estate continued in the Rogers name till within about a dozen years. It would appear from a Court record of March 1651 that the wife of George Rogers had died and that the children were left in need of care. The Court then ordered that one of his children should be entrusted to "Daniel Hard :" Edward Rishworth was to dispose of another, a girl. at Hampton ; AAnthony Emery was to have another and Miss Shapleigh was to have the youngest. "Benja- min Rogers is to have the cow that Goodman Emery had from his father."
The southern part of the original lot of George Rogers was before 1667 in the possession of Richard Miller. His wife, Grace, was, possibly, one of the daughters of George Rogers. She had as a second husband Christopher Banfield. Her children by first marriage were Samuel, Mary and Martha Miller. Samuel- married Mary Neale, and they deeded the homestead to Banfield in 1696, and then the name of Miller disappeared from the early history of Kittery. Banfield sold his lot of ten acres to Richard Rogers in 1697.
The next lot above Rogers was John Green's. It was con- firmed to him by the town in 1648 and was "bounded from a tree by a Gut Side above Franks Fort in ye bottom of ye Cove." It was estimated at thirty acres and was a square lot, and the little island of Franks Fort, containing about an acre, as a subsequent deed declares, was added to the grant, "over and above." Green had additional grant in 1656, further up the river, in Berwick, and moved there, leaving this lower lot to his son Richard.
Robert Weymouth bought a portion of the Green lot, on the south side, and added to it by town grants. His estate was administered in 1662. James Emery bought the place and sold it to Stephen Robinson in 1663. Robinson moved to Oyster River, and sold his place in Kittery to Joseph Hammond. 5 April 1679. Here Joseph Hammond built his garrison, a little north of the present Greenacre Hotel, and here the Indians did their best or worst to capture it. They got Hammond at
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OLD KITTERY
one time but failed to take the garrison-house. We shall have occasion to speak of this again. Joseph Hammond was the son of William of Wells and was one of the most prominent men of his times and Province. He married a sister of Major Charles Frost. He was for many years Town Clerk, a Councillor, Selectman, Deputy to the General Court, Major in the Militia. Recorder of Deeds, and Judge of the Court of Com- mon Pleas.
The rest of the Green lot passed, after many years, into the possession of Joseph Hammond or of Stephen Tobey, who lived next north thereof.
We have now arrived at Franks Fort, a very ancient name and still retained. It is a small island and is fast disappearing by the erosion of the river's current. Its neighbor, Watts Fort, some- times called Darbys Fort in the old deeds, is now no longer scen at high tide. It was about a mile above Franks Fort. The reason for these names no one has yet discovered. They never served as fortifications, though they may have been named because of their resemblance to such at a distance. The stretch of water below Franks Fort has borne the name of "Long Reach" from the earliest days.
Beginning at the cove just above Franks Fort and extending northwest two hundred and forty rods and inland five hundred and eighty rods, or just half way to York River, is a tract of land known in ancient deed as "the Knowles Purchase." Some have supposed and written that this Knowles was an Indian Saga- more, perhaps confusing him with Rowles the Sagamore of Newichawannock. Even Sullivan, in his History of Maine, mis- calls the latter, Knowls. The owner was the Rev. Hansard Knollys, sometimes called Knowles, third pastor of the Church in Dover, N. H. Knollys was a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and had preached in England nine years before com- ing to America. He came to Dover in 1638 and left there for England in 1641. He probably purchased this tract of land from Henry Jocelyn soon after his arrival in this region, and he sold it to the General Court of Massachusetts before his return to England The record is as follows: "The Court agreed to buy Mr. Hansard Knowles his purchase for thirtye pounds, as hee tendereth it." After his return to England Mr. Knollys became a Baptist preacher of note and quite a voluminous author. He
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-
FRANKS FORT.
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OLD KITTERY
was a learned man and of pious character. He suffered impris- onment and stoning for his religious convictions. He died, as it is written. "in a transport of joy." 19 Sept. 1691, aged ninety- three years.1
A PORTION OF THE BA Y LAND.
The Court gave this land to William Hawthorne of Salem in return for some services, 14 Oct. 1651.2 Ile was the emigrant ancestor of the great novelist, Nathaniel Hawthorne. It was next sold to Capt. John Leverett of Boston, for "eight Hodgs- eads of Sault & tenn thousand foote of boards." Leverett sold it to Thomas Broughton, who sold it. 4 July 1659. to Major Themas Clark, a merchant of Boston, who had extensive business relations with this region. The heirs of Clark were Mehitable Warren, Elisha Hutchinson and wife, Elizabeth, and these sold the land, 18 Dec. 1699, to Joseph Hammond, Esq .. David Libbey, Matthew Libbey. Daniel Fogg, and Stephen Tobey. All the grantees except Hammond had been living here for some years without any proper title to the land. A plot of this land is still preserved in the Massachusetts Archives, as "laid out by John
Dr. Alonzo H. Quint's First Parish in Dover. pp. 93-4.
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