USA > Maine > Pioneers on Maine rivers, with lists to 1651 > Part 28
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PEMAQUID RIVER
Extrinsic Evidence. It may now be impossible to identify the perpetrator of the dual forgery, but one of the persons who pre- sented the deeds for record is reported to have served sentence for a similar offence. The title to sixty-four square miles of terri- tory beyond Pemaquid was an adequate motive.
In 1688, James Stilson, who had married a daughter of Alex- ander Gould, claimed Muscongus Island, situated near New Har- bor, as a marriage portion from his wife's mother, who was the eldest daughter of John Brown. He asserted that his wife's grandfather had acquired the island from Samoset in 1652.
That date reverses the last two figures of 1625 and shows that Brown secured some deed from Samoset at about the time that he disposed of his property at Woolwich. Hence, the reason why he had made no objection to the conveyance from Samoset to Richard Pearce ten years earlier, or to that of Richard Ful- ford during the following year, although both tracts were in- cluded in the description of the forged document, is apparent.§
The conviction that the deed of 1625 was forged may be strengthened by collateral reference. John, the eldest son of the New Harbor pioneer, was born in 1635 and resided with his father until thirty years of age. He was living with his parents throughout the period in which the Pearce and Fulford deeds were executed. In a sworn, but unsigned, statement against his own interest, that son declared that his brother-in-law Richard Pearce had bought land within the area defined by the forged con- veyance, with his father's knowledge and without any objection.
He also maintained that his father had occupied his home- stead at New Harbor under a lease from Aldworth and Elbridge and had laid claim to no other tracts in the vicinity except "Somerset Island" in Broad Bay and a point called "Sawk Head" (Saquid), lying about three leagues eastward from New Harbor at the mouth of Saint George's River .*
§ Me. Doc. Hist., 6-262.
Commissioners' Report, 1811-115.
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330
PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
ISLE OF MONHEGAN
Lost amid wild northern gales Fleeting hulls and phantom sails, Fluttering from yard and mast, Vanish in the magic past.
Outlines of a Spanish ship On its long swells rise and dip, Landing in the crimson dawn, Chests of pirate cargazon.
Here the fishermen of France Dream of pleasure and romance- Of Yvonnes and Juliettes- While they mend their broken nets.
Safely anchored in its lee, Three leagues off within the sea,
English mariners of yore Scan the strange, uncharted shore.
On this bit of Occident, Men of Plymouth pitch their tent ; In the cabins roughly made, Men of Bristol ply their trade.
Thrice abandoned, desolate, Once the threshold of a state, Scarred by storms and worn with tides, Gray Monhegan still abides.
331
PEMAQUID RIVER
MONHEGAN ISLAND.
Champlain called the island "La Nef" on account of its re- semblance to a ship. Dutch mariners of the contemporary period, like Hendricksen and Jacobs, followed the lead of Champlain in their translation "Het Schip," while Smith in 1614, Brawnde in 1616, Dermer in 1619, and Piddock and Levett in 1624, spelled
THE CLIFFS, MONHEGAN
it Monahiggan, Manehegin, Monahiggon, Menhegen and Mon- higgen, respectively. An Italian chart of 1631 combines both names in the legend "I. Schip ò Manabigon." No Maine name has been given more varied forms by European linguists.
The island is situated in latitude 43° 45' 53" and longitude 69° 18' 59" and contains 433 acres. Its extreme altitude is 178 feet above sea level. Its harbor is situated on the southerly side, between it and the small island of Manana.
While it might be difficult to present conclusive proof of the occasion for it, historical allusions point unmistakably to this port as the principal point of arrival and departure for British commerce with New England during the first three decades of the Seventeenth Century. While the fishing grounds in that vicinity were never considered superior to those on the Grand Banks, nor about the Isles of Shoals, Captain John Smith asserted, without
332
PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
qualification, that all fishing masters, before the year 1622, had confined their operations to a square area of two or three leagues about the island.
The poetical tradition that the trail of a calf in the dew was responsible for the delineation of the main thoroughfare of Bos- ton, leads to a similar inference that the first voyage of George Waymouth dominated sentiment in Europe and, so far as Eng- lish navigators were concerned, fixed the future point of contact with Northern Virginia.
In 1605, under patronage of the influential Earl of Arundel, Waymouth sailed from Bristol in the Archangel. He was the first mariner who had ever attempted a direct course for New Eng- land; other vessels had made the voyage by way of Spain or the West Indies. He first sighted land near Cape Cod, but turned northward to seek his objective. May 17, he erected a wooden cross on Monhegan, which, in the fervor of gratitude for a safe arrival, he named Saint George's Island.
Later he anchored his ship in the mouth of Saint George's River which he christened Pentecost Harbor. From that point he visited Pemaquid and conducted personal expeditions for sixty miles up the Sagadahoc and for forty miles up Saint George's River, where, on the bank above Thomaston, he erected a second cross. At his departure he kidnapped five Indians, one of whom was a native of Pemaquid, known as Nahanada, and withdrew to Monhegan for safety during his fishing operations.t
The Indians were left in an excited frame of mind. Only a few days later Champlain, returning from his first voyage to Malabarre (Cape Cod) toward Saint Croix, found the natives at Sagadahoc in a state of hostility toward strangers on account of the recent seizure of their chief men. He was assured that Way- mouth's vessel was still anchored at the islands. It was on that occasion that the French styled Monhegan "La Nef," or "Ship Island," a name which was used afterward on many Dutch, Italian and Portuguese charts.
Monhegan was visited by Pring in 1606, and by the colonists from Sagadahoc, during the next two years.
Familiarity with the accounts of northern adventurers who had followed in the wake of the first colony, and the lack of more definite knowledge concerning the New England coast generally,
Me. Hist. Col., 3-297.
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PEMAQUID RIVER
kept the ocean route fixed, with exploratory excursions trending sometimes north, but usually south, from the terminal. As to the accumulation of maritime information, Edward Godfrey pre- sented a petition to representatives of the dominant administra- tion in England, in 1659, in which he claimed to have in his possession a record of "all passages" from the British Isles to America for forty years.}
April 27, 1610, King James of England granted colonization privileges in Newfoundland to a society of English noblemen and merchants. This association was styled "The Company of Ad- venturers, and Planters of the Citie of London, and Bristoll, for the Colony or Plantation in New-found-land."§
Some of these patentees were identical with those who after- wards helped to colonize Maine. Among them were Humphrey Hook, and John Langton, of Bristol, and Abraham Jennings of Plymouth, whose exercise of their royal franchise brought them in close contact with French adventurers who were interested in the development of Canadian trade. The English merchants, however, were inclined to dominate the situation on the northern seas, although French mariners had been earlier visitors to that coast. According to Champlain they eventually became masters, "imposant un tribut sur la pesche du poison : la tout pour les travailler, & en fin leur faire quitter la pesche, en se rendant maistre de toutes les costes peu a peu."
Damariscove, Manana and Monhegan islands were usually associated in historical reference with the mainland of Pemaquid, or Pemacuit, as designated upon a map of 1610. July 29, of that year, Sir Samuel Argal and Sir George Somers, with two vessels from Virginia Colony, had ranged the coast as far north as Seal Island in the Matinicus group .*
Upon Argal's return southward he must have observed Mon- hegan. Later in the season it was sighted by Jean de Biencourt, while on his way from France to Port Royal. The French classed that island with the Metinic group, which they called "Emetenic."
In the summer of 1611, the islands at Monhegan formed a safe haven for the captains of two English fishing vessels. They found there Captain Platrier, a resident of Honfleur, who had just settled on the old French site at Saint Croix River. A ransom
¿ N. H. State Papers, 17-509.
Purchase, 19-407.
Purchase, 19-80.
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334
PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
was exacted from him for his freedom and he was admonished not to fish or trade on the coast in that vicinity.
November 6, of the same year, Biencourt and Pierre Biard, who had been exploring the Sagadahoc River, found English fishing boats at Monhegan which had been stored there for use in the following spring. Biard reported that the English came "in the summer to fish, at this island of Emetenic," which was located by him "eight leagues from the fort they had begun building." The fortification to which he referred was Fort Saint George.i
While it has been assumed by late writers of Maine history that there was an early French plantation on the mainland at Castine, this claim is not substantiated by any accounts of the period. The real location of the first French settlement in that vicinity was upon Mount Desert Island, which was regarded as part of Norumbega or Pentagoet district. The latter was but another name for Penobscot. The presence of European settlers at the island was unknown to Virginians, who ranged and fished in northern waters, until it was disclosed to them by local Indians. If there had been a plantation in Penobscot Bay at that time, its existence would have been known to all English fishermen.
In the summer of 1613, after the French had become well established at Pemetiq, or Mount Desert, which had been named by them Saint Sauveur, Biard alluded to Damariscove and Mon- hegan as the "Isles of Pencoit" (Pemaquid). His words were: "Now the English of Virginia are accustomed every year to come to the Pencoit Islands, which are 25 leagues from St. Sauveur, to lay in a supply of codfish for the winter."
As soon as the Virginians had located the French settlement at Mount Desert, an immediate and successful attack was made under the leadership of Sir Samuel Argal. As a consequence the colony was entirely dispersed and some of the captives were transported to the "Pencoit islands and entrusted to English fishermen for conveyance to France."}
In 1614, Sir Thomas Smith and the Virginia Council dis- patched Captain John Smith from The Downs with two vessels and forty-five men and boys. His masters were Michael Cooper and Thomas Hunt. With his party there was an expert named Samuel Crampton, who had had previous experience in whale fishing at Newfoundland.
+ Jesuit Rel., 2-31. 47.
# Jesuit Rel., 2-253, 263, 275.
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PEMAQUID RIVER
Smith arrived about the end of April and established his headquarters in the little harbor between Monhegan and Manana. He planted a garden on the heights of the former island and was engaged chiefly with exploring the coast while his men were fish- ing. The only other English ship found by him in that vicinity was that of Sir Francis Popham, which was anchored in the mainland opposite the island.
The explorer had intended to keep possession of the entire district with ten of his companions, but conditions did not prove favorable for that purpose. He sailed from the island and reached England August 5, but the Long-Robert, commanded by Hunt, re- mained to complete its cargo of fish and, on the way to Virginia, kidnapped twenty-nine Indians from the vicinity of Capawick (Martha's Vineyard). All but two of these natives were sold as slaves in Spain, where Hunt disposed of his fish. One of them was Tisquantum of Patuxet.
In June, 1614, the West Countrymen, under the direction of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, sent Edward Harlow, who had been a member of the original Sagadahoc Colony, Nicholas Hobson, John Matthew and some of Gorges' relatives named Sturton, to locate and take possession of a gold mine at Capawick. They found their destination with the help of the Indians Assacomoit, Epenow and Wenape, but Epenow, who had promised to locate the mine, escaped to his relatives. The native tribes were so much incensed at the recent perfidy of Hunt that the object of the ex- pedition was entirely frustrated.
The next year Smith was engaged by Gorges, and his asso- ciates in the Isle of Wight and Western England, to undertake the supervision of another voyage to Capawick. Accordingly, he embarked with Thomas Dermer, Edward Rocraft, alias Stalling, and fourteen others and proposed "to stay in the countrey," but pirates captured him in one of his vessels and detained him in France until December. His other vessel, in charge of Dermer, reached Monhegan in May and returned to England in August, after a prosperous voyage.
Smith's old crews of the previous year were employed by the Virginia Company, of London, and began to fish on the Maine coast in March with four ships. One went to Virginia to supply the colony, one was taken by pirates and the others reached home in six months, well freighted with fish and furs.
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336
PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
October 15, 1615, the Virginia Company dispatched Sir Rich- ard Hawkins from London with two ships "to trye the Winter." According to Gorges, he "undertook by authority from the Coun- cil of the second Colony to try what service he could do them as President for that year."
Smith reported that this expedition crossed the Atlantic by way of the West Indies and did not arrive in New England until the following spring, "wasting in that time, their seasons, vict- uall, and healths."
He found six fishing vessels, four of which were from Plym- outh, "harbourd in manehegin." The Blessing and David hailed from that western port and were in charge of Arthur Hitchens and John Winter; the Judith and Trial, from London, were com- manded by William West and James Edwards ; the Nachen, from Dartmouth, of which Edward Brawnde was master, had sighted Seguin April 20 and reached Monhegan four days later. The crew of the Nachen consisted of twenty-one men and the London ships were manned with forty-four men and boys.
As chief admiral of New England, Hawkins commandeered the boats which he found in the possession of Brawnde and others and with them laded one of his own vessels with fish and train oil and dispatched it homeward before the close of the sea- son. He left the island with some of the fishing craft July 21, and the rest followed him the next day.
Gorges, who from the first had appeared to be skeptical of the outcome, dismissed the account of Hawkins' achievements in his usual perfunctory way, remarking that he had "spent the time of his being in those parts in searching of the country and find- ing out the commodities thereof." However, some allowance was made in the following conclusion: "But the war was at the height, and the principal natives almost destroyed; so that his observation could not be such as could give account of any new matter, more than formerly had been received. From thence he passed along the coast to Virginia, and stayed there some time in expectation of what he could not be satisfied in ; so took his next course for Spain, to make the best of such commodities he had got together, as he coasted from place to place, having sent his ship laden with fish to the market before. And this was all that was done by any of us that year."§
§ Me. Hist. Col., 2-28.
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PEMAQUID RIVER
Brawnde assured Smith that there were "greet voyages" to be made in New England in the fish and fur industries, but sug- gested that only one factor, or agent, should be permitted to control and license Indian commerce and that fishing boats were inadequate and expensive. Aside from these temporary disadvan- tages, he concluded that the country was good and "worthye of prayes" and the climate healthful, and that the natives, who fre- quented the company of the English "vere much," were harmless .*
Smith claimed that the Plymouth ships returned-one of them by way of Spain-"well fraught, and their men well, within 5 months and odde daies"; that one of those from London "returned againe into England within five months and a few dayes; the other went to the Canaries with dry fish, which they solde at a great rate, for royalls of eight, and * turned Pirates."+ *
Dermer, who had escaped from pirates when on his way to New England in 1615, sailed during the following year for New- foundland, where he was associated with Captain John Mason, then governor of that island. His residence was located at "Cuper's Cove" on Conception Bay. The place may have been named for David Cooper, one of his acquaintances. Dermer was still living there September 9, 1616, as his letter of that date was mentioned by Purchase. While at the island he met Tis- quantum, who had been captured by Hunt and sold in Spain. The Indian had been emancipated by John Slanie, of London, one of the northern patentees, who had educated him for a year and sent him to Newfoundland, hoping to profit by his knowledge of New England.
In 1617, Captain Smith formulated a new plan to settle in Maine with fifteen men, but his ships were becalmed so long at Plymouth that they sought Newfoundland instead, because the winds were more favorable for that course and the fishing in that latitude was not so far advanced.
In 1618, five vessels from London and two from Plymouth visited Monhegan "to fish and trade only." One of those from the latter port belonged to Gorges and furnished transportation for Edward Rocraft. The latter had special instructions to unite with Dermer and Tisquantum, who had agreed to come thither from Newfoundland. Rocraft's party consisted of about a dozen men who were supplied with salt and other necessaries for fishing and
* N. E. Hist. Gen. Reg., 28-249.
/ Smith's Trav. & Works, 1-241.
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PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
had made a compact to remain in the country during the winter.
Captain Smith asserted, in a letter to Lord Bacon, that until that year no English ship had undertaken to fish outside "a square of two leagues" for a distance of two or three hundred leagues along the New England coast. This area-equivalent to an ordinary township, only six miles square-was situated about Monhegan. All other favorable localities had been neglected.
Although Rocraft was provided with a pinnace for coasting, he confiscated a French bark, which he found fishing and trading in a creek near the island. No doubt, his detention by French pirates in 1615, when he had planned to reach and spend the winter in New England with Smith, inspired him to take this summary action in the spirit of retaliation. After the fishing season was concluded the captive crew was dispatched to Eng- land in the vessel of Gorges, who afterwards complained of the seizure of the bark, because he was compelled by the admiralty court to reimburse its owner.
As winter approached and Rocraft began to despair of meet- ing Dermer at Monhegan that season, he decided to winter in Virginia, where he had lived formerly and had friends of long standing. His proposed course was in plain violation of explicit orders from Gorges. He excused his own refractory conduct in that instance with the pretext that a serious disaffection had de- veloped among his men, and that the disloyal members had been left in the North, where they might secure valuable information in the public interest.
Some of his party, which must have included Richard Vines, objected to the proposed southern trip and were left at Saco, where they did not continue long, but withdrew to "Menehighon, an Iland lying some three leagues in the Sea, and fifteene leagues" distant. They remained on that island "all that Winter, with bad lodging, and worse fare."
The removal of the "mutineers" to Monhegan was proof that the island, bad as it might have been for food supplies, did pro- vide some accommodation in the way of shelter and was recog- nized generally as the sole resort of English fishermen.
At any rate, Rocraft with a few congenial companions sought the milder climate of Virginia, where they arrived in December. April 18, of the next year, the explorer was present when Sir George Yardley, the new governor, reached Jamestown. He was
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PEMAQUID RIVER
killed a few days later in a duel with William Epps, an old Virginian planter, and his death was reported to the refugees at Monhegan in the following month by Captain John Ward, of Virginia.#
According to the Council of Plymouth, Dermer did not go directly from Newfoundland to New England, where he had agreed to meet Rocraft in 1618, "at our usuall place of fishing" (Monhegan). He chose to act upon the advice of Captain Mason and visited England first in order to confer with Gorges and secure means for the undertaking. He took Tisquantum with him to London, but arrived too late to complete arrangements to proceed that season and remained there during the winter.
In the spring of 1619 he came from Plymouth to Monhegan in the fishing ship which belonged to Gorges. The crew con- sisted of thirty-eight men and boys. The explorer was in the em- ployment of Gorges and his agreement required that he should reside in New England and cooperate with Rocraft. At the island he learned from the "Mutiners which hee found there," and who had lived there "all that Winter," that his predecessor had gone to Virginia.§
With the arrival of Dermer on the Maine coast it was learned that the widespread ravages of an unknown contagious disease had almost depopulated New England. This mysterious epidemic had been raging for three years, without abatement, and some of the scattered survivors were destroyed subsequently by re- mote hostile tribes.
Such wholesale extinction of the aborigines of New England was regarded by Dermer and his associates as a special dispensa- tion of Providence, designed to pave the way for peaceable oc- cupation by English planters. In correspondence with Captain Smith he was convinced, to use his own words, "that God had laid this Country open for us, and slaine the most part of the inhabitants by cruell warres, and a mortall disease."
Smith, disclosing Dermer as his informant at that time, re- marked, "where I have seene 100 or 200 people" (in 1614) "there is scarce ten to be found." Relative to the conditions in Maine, he had been advised that "From Pembrocks bay to Harrintons bay" (Penobscot to Casco Bay) "there is not 20; from thence
¿ Purchase, 19-121.
§ Purchase, 19-276.
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PIONEERS ON MAINE RIVERS
to Cape An, some 30," survivors of the pestilence. Yet, he learned that the only European who succumbed was a shipwrecked Frenchman .*
The same or a greater percentage of mortality had prevailed in Massachusetts. At the time of his advent at New Plymouth, Winslow reported that Tisquantum was then "the only native of Patuxet, where we now inhabit." That writer added that this Indian "was one of the twenty captives that by Hunt were carried away, and had been in England, and dwelt in Cornhill with Mas- ter John Slanie, a merchant, and could speak a little English."¡
Dermer decided to seek Rocraft in the South and, incidentally, to attempt the discovery of a supposed passage to the Pacific Ocean. Accordingly, in May he shipped the greater part of his provisions in the Sampson, a vessel from Jamestown in which Captain Ward, who had been fishing for his colony at Monhegan, was ready to return to Virginia.
Dermer, however, before leaving New England, visited the island of Capawick, to investigate the report of a gold mine which had been elaborated by Epenow five years before. There he "found seven severall places digged" and "sent home" some of the earth from Monhegan, to which he had returned June 23.
Thence he coasted southward in company with four or five other members of the ship's crew who had been assigned to him by Gorges. For this voyage he utilized the open pinnace which had been abandoned by Rocraft the previous year.
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