USA > Maine > Cumberland County > Portland > The history of Portland, from 1632 to 1864: with a notice of previous settlements, colonial grants, and changes of government in Maine > Part 37
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! This was Dea. James Milk; he was born in Boston in 1711, and was by oc- cupation a ship carpenter or boat builder. In 1735 he married Sarah Brown, by whom he had a large family of children ; he was a useful and much respected man, was for many years deacon of the first church, and selectman of the town for sixteen years. He died November 10, 1772; Mr. Smith preached a sermon on the occasion from these words, "Behold an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile." His children were James, who died the year after his father, aged twenty-nine, leaving one son, James M., Mary, married to Moses Little of Newburyport, Dorcas, married to Nathaniel Deering, Elizabeth, married to Abra- ham Greenleaf of Newburyport, Eunice, married to John Deering, Abigail, mar- ried to Joseph H. Ingraham, and Lucy married to John Nichols. Eunice, the last survivor, was born in 1749 and died in 1835, aged eighty-six. The house
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
went out in pursuit of them. Capt. Skillings marched in the direction of Windham and succeeded in saving the people and property of that place ; he arrived in season to put the enemy to flight soon after they had commenced an attack upon the inhabitants, in which one was killed and one wounded and scalped. The Indians left five packs, a bow, a bunch of ar- rows, and several other articles. On another occasion the same year, when a report reached here that the fort at St. George was attacked, a number of our young men proceeded without delay to offer their assistance.1 In April, 1757, Joseph Cox and Mr. Bailey, of this town, fitted out a small expedition on private account, against the Penobscot Indians, and returned early in June, bringing with them two canoes, a quantity of oil, fish, and feathers, and the scalps of two men whom they had killed. The war in our part of the country was carried on in this desultory manner on both sides; the out-settlements were kept in continual alarm by small divisions of the enemy scattered over the province, and lighting, like the wary hawk, wherever spoil was easy to be obtained; no regular efforts were made by either party.
The war was not formally declared by the English until May, 1756, although hostilities in America had commenced two years before ; the king in his declaration states that ever since the treaty of Aix la Chapelle, the French had been making en- croachments upon his American subjects, and had in 1754, without any previous notice, broke out into acts of open hos- tility and seized an English fort on the Ohio.2 All attempts
1 The next year in September, an alarm having been given of a great firing at St. George and it being supposed that the fort there was attacked, one hundred and fifty men, mostly volunteers, immediately hastened by water to their relief. -Smith's Journal.
2 This was Fort Du Quesne, now Pittsburg.
in Exchange street, in which she lived sixty years, was sold and moved in 1853 to make way for the block of stores erected on the lot. The name is extinct here.
433
WAR OF 1754.
to procure reparation having been unavailing, the last resort of injured nations was applied. The three first years of the war had been generally unsuccessful ; it had been conducted at great expense and without much system. But in 1758, un- der the vigorous administration of the elder Pitt, English affairs both in Europe and America assumed a new aspect, and her arms became triumphant. In pursuance of a recommendation from Mr. Pitt, the General Court resolved to raise seven thou- sand men for an expedition against Canada; this was the largest force ever raised by the province ; but the hope of con- quering Canada and driving from their neighborhood an en- emy by whom they were exposed to continual fear and loss, stimulated them to an extraordinary effort. About six hundred men of this force were raised in Maine, and sailed for Kittery to join the army on the 21st of May. The result of the cam- paign was very unfavorable; the principal object of the ex- pedition, the capture of Ticonderoga, failed, and our army of about fifteen thousand men disgracefully abandoned the siege, and retreated with loss of men and munitions of war, before an inferior force. The ill success may be attributed partly to the fall of the accomplished Lord Howe at the commencement of the attack. The effect of this disaster was somewhat diminished by the capture of Louisburg, which ca- pitulated to our arms July 26, 1758; the siege had been car- ried on with great spirit, and the garrison did not surrender until they had lost fifteen hundred men, and the town was a heap of ruins.1 The number of prisoners was five thousand six hundred and thirty-seven. The arrival of this intelligence at Falmouth on the 17th of August, occasioned great joy, and the people spent the afternoon and most of the night in rejoic- ing.2. The next year the war was pursued with larger prepa-
1 There were found in this fortress two hundred and twenty-one pieces of can- non, eighteen mortars, and a large quantity of stores and ammunition.
2 Smith's Journal, August 17, 1758.
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
rations and a more determined spirit on the part of the mother country. The provinces also partaking of the zeal which ani- mated the ministry at home, raised large supplies of men to co-operate in the favorite design upon Canada. Massachusetts raised six thousand eight hundred men, of whom two thou- sand five hundred served in the garrison at Louisburg, several hundred in the navy, three hundred joined General Wolfe before Quebec,' and the remainder served under General Amherst, who entered Canada by Lake Champlain, with a tri- umphal progress, capturing in his course the forts at Ticon- deroga, Crown Point, and Niagara.
It was one of the conditions imposed by the General Court in voting the last division of this large enlistment of soldiers, that four hundred men of the levy should be employed under direction of the Governor to erect a fort at the mouth of Pe- nobscot river. In pursuance of this plan, Gov. Pownal went to Penobscot in May2 and constructed upon a point in the town of Prospect, since called Fort Point, one of the most substan- tial and well appointed fortifications that had ever been erect- ed in Maine.3 Gov. Pownal was accompanied in this expedi- tion by Brigadier General Waldo, who being a large proprietor in the Waldo patent, on which the fort was laid out, was deeply interested in the result of the enterprise.
After laying out the ground for the fort and making prepa- rations for its construction, Gov. Pownal with Gen. Waldo, and a portion of his force, made an expedition up the Penob- scot river, of which he thus speaks in his Journal, in the 5th Vol. of the Maine Historical Collections. "Landed on the east
! Among the persons from Falmouth who served in Wolfe's army, were Briga- dier Preble, then a captain, John Waite, afterward a colonel, and William McLellan. Col. Waite commanded a transport.
2 He touched in here May 4th, and remained until the 8th.
3 It was called Fort Pownal, in compliment to the governor, and cost five thou- sand pounds which was repaid by England. For details concerning this trans- action, see 5th Maine Historical Collections, p. 363.
435
GENERAL WALDO.
side of the river with one hundred and thirty-six men and pro- ceeded to the head of the first falls, about four and a quarter miles from the first ledge. Clear land on the left for near four miles. Brigadier Waldo, whose unremitted zeal for the service had prompted him, at the age of sixty-three, to attend me on the expedition, dropped down just above the falls of an apo- plexy, and notwithstanding all the assistance that could be given, expired in a few moments." This was in the town of Brewer, and corrects erroneous statements in Williamson's History of Maine, vol ii. p. 338, and of Mr. Sabine in the North American Review, vol. Iviii. p. 313, in which Waldo is made to say "Here is my bound," and as Sabine adds, "drop- ped dead on the site of a city." At the head of the Falls, Pownal adds "Buried a leaden plate with the following inscrip- tion. May 23, 1759, Province of Massachusetts Bay. Domin- ions of Great Britain. Possession confirmed by T. Pownal, Governor.
Erected a flag staff .- Hoisted the king's colors and saluted them."l
1 Gen. Waldo was born in England; a son of Jonathan Waldo, a respectable merchant in Boston, who died in 1731, leaving a large estate to his five children. He was interested in eastern lands, and his son Samuel was connected with him in these speculations. On his death, Samuel came into possession of large tracts here and further east. The General was the largest proprietor of land in this town for many years, having purchased the rights of old proprietors previous to 1730. In 1730 he bought eight hundred acres of the proprietors' committee, and seized every opportunity to extend his interest here. He was an active, in- telligent, and persevering man, and spent much time in town. He died at the age of sixty-three, leaving by wife Lucy Wainwright of Ipswich, two sons, Sam- uel and Francis, who lived in this town, and daughters, Hannah, married to Isaac Winslow of Roxbury, and Lucy married to Thomas Flucker of Boston, who were the parents of the late Gen. Knox's wife ; a third son, Ralph, died young. Gen. Waldo went to England in 1729 to defend the interest of the Lincoln proprietors, and published a pamphlet in vindication of their rights. He was an accomplished gentleman, and as a military officer, of an elegant and commanding figure. His portrait, which adorned the walls of the Knox mansion, represented him as tall and straight, of dark complexion. He had crossed the Atlantic fifteen times.
.
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
The fort was completed in July, garrisoned by one hundred men placed under the command of Colonel Jedediah Preble of Falmouth, on his return from Canada.' He was there in March, 1760.
The campaign of 1759 was crowned with complete success by the capture of Quebec on the 17th of September. No event could have produced greater joy in the colonies than this. It had been the place from which, for a long series of years, had issued the decrees that had armed and let loose upon our frontiers a merciless and remorseless enemy. Various unsuc- cessful attempts had been made in the previous sixty years, at an immense cost and an extravagant waste of life, to drive this power from the continent. Now that the object of the most ardent wishes of the colonists was accomplished, public feeling swelled to the highest note of joy. Mr. Smith in his Journal says, "the country is all in extasy upon the surprising news of the conquest of Quebec." Information of the battle on the plains of Abraham, September 13, in which the opposing gen- erals, Wolfe and Montcalm, were killed, reached here October 14; on the 15th and 16th the cannon at the fort were fired, Mr. Mayo's house was illuminated, and small arms were fired in the evening.2 The next evening three mast ships in the harbor were illuminated. The 25th of the same month was
1 Mr. Preble had the command of a company of provincial troops in the ex- pedition against Canada, was in the battle on the plains of Abraham before Que- bec, and near Gen. Wolfe when he fell, and was wounded in the thigh. He was subsequently promoted.
2 Ebenezer Mayo; his house stood on the west side of India street, near the corner of Newbury now Sumner street. He was a respectable merchant and came here from Boston. He left three children, Apphia, Simeon, and Ebenezer, the last of whom was born in 1764, and died in this town September 12, 1840, aged 70; no child survived him. His first wife was a daughter of Dr. Coffin, whom he married in 1792 and who died in 1793; his second was Jane Brown of Boston, married in 1795; third, Catharine, a daughter of Deacon Richard Con- man, married in 1811. He and his brother Simeon became intemperate and died poor. Simeon left several children.
437
TREATY OF PARIS, AND WITH THE INDIANS.
observed as a day of public thanksgiving for the brilliant suc- cesses of the campaign.
The French power in this country having been thus broken, the Indians who had fought under it, immediately sought safety by submission to the conqueror ; in the spring of 1760, the Penobscots, the St. John's, and Passamaquoddy Indians, and those of Nova Scotia, finding they could not unaided by French power and influence, resist the English arms, entered into a treaty of peace, and from that time forever ceased to become formidable in the northern colonies. The conquest of Canada was completed September 8, 1760, by the surrender of Mon- treal, the other posts of the. French having previously capitula- ted ; but in Europe the war was not terminated until February . 1763. News of the surrender of Montreal and the total ex- tinguishment of French hopes on this continent, was received in town September 20, 1760, and caused a renewal of the re- joicing of the preceding year : on the evening of September 22, Rev. Mr. Smith's house and several others on the Neck were illuminated, and a public thanksgiving was kept for the reduction of Canada.
By the treaty of peace which was signed at Paris, in March, 1763, the French ceded all Canada to Great Britain, and Louis- iana to Spain, and thus took leave of the North American Con- tinent : since which, they have never had foothold upon it, save . the short period in the reign of Napoleon, that they held Loui- siana. When it is considered, how much blood had been shed, how much suffering, desolation, and sorrow had been brought upon the English colonies by the arms and the influ- ence of the French over the Indians, their ever faithful allies, from 1688, we cannot be surprised at the deep and well founded satisfaction with which they viewed the removal of all fear of future alarm and depredation from that quarter.
CHAPTER XVII.
POPULATION AT DIFFERENT PERIODS BEFORE THE REVOLUTION-TAXES-CURRENCY-LUMBER AND SAW - MILLS-GRIST MILLS-TRADE AND COMMERCE-CUSTOMS-WHARVES-GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE TOWN AND BUILDINGS AT THE TIME OF THE REVOLUTION-STREETS.
The Neck, now Portland, at the time of which we are speak- ing, was the chief seat of business and the central point of population of the town. It had increased more rapidly than any other part of the territory, and from its single family in 1715, had gone on with a steady progress to the period of the revolution. In 1725 the number of families in the whole town was forty-five, of which twenty-seven were upon the Neck, seventeen in Purpooduck and Spurwink, and one at New Casco. The next year, although it was the termination of a destructive war, the number of the families had increased to sixty-four, beside thirteen or fourteen unmarried men. By a calculation of six to a family, which may be considered a fair average, the population at that time will be found to have been about four hundred.' Some idea of the number of inhabitants in 1740
1 At the birth of Peter, the second son of Rev. Mr. Smith in 1731, most of the married women on the Neck attended, and their husbands, as the custom was, at supper. This anecdote related to me by a member of that family, now no more, shows the small population on the Neck, and at the same time is illustrative of the simple manners of that day, Mrs. Blake, who died at a very advanced age in 1824, said that when she first came here, she could go out after tea and make a call upon every family on the Neck and return home before nine o'clock.
439
POPULATION.
may be gathered from a remark in Mr. Smith's diary in August ; he says, "an exceeding full congregation and communion, and yet I reckoned more than sixty heads of families that were ab- sent, and many of their whole families with them." This was after the separation of the Purpooduck parish, which probably at that time contained more than one hundred families.1 In 1753, the third, or New Casco parish, containing sixty-two families, was set off, which left to the first parish two hundred and forty families, of which one hundred and twenty were up- on the Neck, forty-eight in Stroudwater, eight on the Islands, and twenty-one at Back Cove. These, at our former calcula- tion, would give to the Neck a population of seven hundred and twenty souls, the parish fourteen hundred and forty, and to the whole town, estimating Purpooduck and Spurwink at one hundred and fifty families, a population of two thousand seven hundred and twelve souls. The number of slaves at this time in Falmouth, was twenty-one.2 In 1759 there were one hund- red and thirty-six dwelling-houses on the Neck, beside four ware-houses occupied by families, the whole embracing one hundred and sixty families, and making the population of the Neck nine hundred and sixty. In 1760 there were eleven French neutrals in town, under the distribution of the commit-
1 In 1745 the ratable polls in Cape Elizabeth parish were one hundred and ninety-eight ; the valuation of real and personal estate was seven thousand three hundred and thirty-five pounds and seventeen shillings. Ratable polls were males of sixteen years of age and upward ; they constituted about twenty-five per cent. of the population ; the age for rating polls was subsequently advanced to eighteen years, and in 1825 in this State, to twenty-one years. In 1749 the second parish, Cape Elizabeth, petitioned to be incorporated as a town, and stated in their petition, that their precinct was ten miles in length and about five miles in breadth, and contained about one hundred and fifty families. In 1742 the number of white polls in Massachusetts was forty-one thousand ; in 1735 thirty-five thousand four hundred and twenty-seven,
2 Massachusetts Historical Collection, N. S., vol. iii. p. 95. There were in York twenty-four slaves at this period, Kittery, thirty-five, Wells, sixteen, Scar- borough, eleven, Berwick twenty-two, Arundel, three, Brunswick, three. George- town, seven, Gorham, two.
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
tee. Their names were Paul LcBlanc, wife and nine children. Sixty-one of these people were assigned to Maine. The whole number to Massachusetts and Maine was about thirteen hund- red. It appears by a census taken in 1764, that the number of dwelling-houses in the whole town in that year was four hun- dred and sixty, which contained five hundred and eighty-five families, and a population of three thousand seven hundred and eighty-three.' In 1774 by an estimate on the polls of the first parish which were then four hundred and eighty-one, and which included a few families at Back Cove, the population of the Neck was a little over nineteen hundred .? In October of the next year, the number of houses on the Neck was two hundred and thirty, some of which contained two or three families; if the number of families which occupied these houses was three hun- dred and twenty, which does not seem to be an unreasonable calculation, we shall arrive at a result similar to the one fur- nished by an estimate on the polls. In the absence therefor of any certain information on the subject, we may not deviate far from the truth in fixing upon nineteen hundred as the popula- tion of that part of Falmouth now included in Portland, at the commencement of the war of the revolution.3 The Neck may be called the parent stock which sent out its branches to the re- mote portions of the territory. The parishes at Purpooduck,
' There were forty-four negroes not included in the above number ; the popu- lation of Maine by this census was fifty-four thousand and twenty .- Williamson, vol. ii. p. 373.
2 The number of polls at Back Cove in 1770, was fifty-eight, belonging to the first parish, who were assessed in the parish tax forty-eight pounds twelve shil- lings and eleven pence of three hundred twenty-eight pounds three shillings and five pence.
3 In January, 1777, the selectmen returned seven hundred and eighty-five as the whole number of males in town of sixteen years and upward, which in- cluded Quakers, Negroes, and Mulattoes, who were not subject to military duty. In 1776 the returns showed for Falmouth a population of three thousand and twenty-six, and Cape Elizabeth, fourteen hundred and sixty-nine.
441
TAXES.
New Casco, and Stroudwater, had been successively set off, and a society of Quakers had sprung up in that section of the town which retains the ancient name. The second parish was invested with separate municipal powers in 1765, under the name of Cape Elizabeth, except for the purpose of choosing a representative to the General Court, for which it remained connected with Falmouth until after the revolution.1
Previous to the incorporation of the second parish, the town and ministerial taxes were assessed in one rate, and money for the support of the ministry was voted by the town ; after the division in 1733, a separation took place in the financial de- partments between the town and parish. In 1727 the whole as- sessment was but one hundred and eighty-four pounds seventeen ยท shillings and seven pence, lawful money ; in 1730 it was three hundred pounds, of which one hundred pounds were for the minister.2 In the course of a few years the town had become considerably embarrassed by the erection of a bridge over Fore river at Stroudwater, and others over the Presumpscot, and by incurring other expenses out of the ordinary course of town charges, to which they had been stimulated by their enterprising character. To relieve themselves from this pressure, they pe- titioned the General Court in 1739, for the privilege of taxing the unimproved lands.3 Liberty was granted them to assess a
1 The king's instructions to the governors forbade the incorporation of towns with the power of sending representatives; new towns and parts set off from old ones were therefore called districts. The act of incorporation was dated Novem- ber 1, 1765 ; the first meeting for the choice of officers was dated December 2, 1765, Capt. John Robinson, Jr., Moderator; Thomas Simonton, District Clerk ; . James Maxwell, Capt. Samuel Skillings, and Mr. Jonathan Lovitt, Selectmen; Peter Woodbury, Constable ; Joseph Mariner, Clement Jordan, and Jos. Wins- sow, Assessors.
2 By the valuation act, passed in 1736, polls were taxed at two shillings and three pence each, and income one penny on the pound; an ox was valued at forty shillings, a cow at thirty shillings, swine eight shillings, a goat three shillings.
3 They set forth in their petition "that about three years past, the court had ordered that the waste lands in Falmouth should be taxed, but owing to delay
29
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HISTORY OF PORTLAND.
tax of two pence an acre on all unimproved land for three years, and the court add, "that no difficulty may arise about said unimproved land, ordered that all land not within lawful fence, be subject to said tax." The next year thirty-two thou- sand eight hundred and thirty-nine acres were taxed under the provisions of that special act. If the petition stated the proportion of unoccupied land correctly, we perceive that the whole quantity of land within the limits of the town to be about thirty-six thousand acres.
In 1745 the town and school tax was three hundred and ten pounds and the parish tax three hundred and sixteen pounds fourteen shillings and six pence, old tenor, assessed upon three hundred and five polls. In 1747 three hundred and sev- enty pounds, old tenor, were raised for town charges ; this was a time when money was at its lowest rate of depreciation. In 1753 when the currency had returned to a sound state, the town tax was forty pounds, or one hundred and thirty-three dollars and thirty-three cents, and the next year' only twenty
1 Of a province tax assessed on eleven towns in Maine in 1743, of fifty-two pounds seventeen shillings and one penny, Falmouth's proportion was seven pounds thirteen shillings and ten pence, paying the highest tax but two, Kittery and York being before it. In 1761, of a provincial tax of one thousand pounds, Maine's proportion was seventy-four pounds six shillings and four and three- fourths pence, Falmouth then paid the highest tax, being thirteen pounds sixteen shillings and two and one-quarter pence ; the next highest was Kittery, whose tax was nine pounds ten shillings and eight and three-fourths pence .- William- son, vol. ii. p. 357.
the inhabitants have had no benefit therefrom ; that this present year, 1739, they have been at near two thousand pounds charge in building a meeting-house and bridges in said town, and will be obliged to fortify their houses and to pay about five hundred pounds more for support of their minister and schoolmaster, if the proprietors of unimproved land are not obliged to help them defray that charge. And in regard that the unimproved lands are defended and bettered by the in- habitants who venture their lives in this time of apprehended danger, and meet with many difficulties in their settlements, and the waste lands make up near nine-tenths of the whole township."
443
TAXES-STROUDWATER BRIDGE.
pounds. These were exclusive of the road tax which was paid in labor.
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