USA > Maine > Cumberland County > Portland > The history of Portland, from its first settlement: with notices of the neighbouring towns, and of the changes of government in Maine, Part II 1700-1833 > Part 5
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During all this time the poverty of the inhabitants had prevented them from completing a house of worship. In February 1720, they had voted to build a meeting-house as soon as possible, to be 36 feet in length, 28 in breadth, and 20 feet stud, and Samuel Moody, Richard Collier and John Sawyer were chosen a committee
1 It was then the practice and continued to be for many years to send round a box every Sabbath to collect a contribution from strangers ; the money was generally appropriated towards supporting the minister. This practice con- tinued in the 1st parish until 1201, when E5 a year was allowed Dr. Deane, instead of the contribution, and the box then ceased its weekly round.
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Ecclesiastical Affairs.
C. 2.]
to superintend the work. But for want of funds, nothing material was done on the subject until the next year, when another order was passed authorising them to go on with the undertaking, and a tax was assessed for the purpose to be paid in timber or such things as were produced in town. Some little activity in the work was caused by this vote, the timber was cut and placed upon a lot at the foot of Middle-street ; the place for erecting the house was not designated until July 3, 1721, when it was "voted that the meeting-house frame should be raised there or thereabouts where the timber now lies upon the rising ground, and that Wednesday the 12th day of this instant July, shall be the day to raise said frame." The memorable day came and the frame of their first meeting-house 36 by 28 feet, which had been the subject of anxious solicitude for more than a year and a half, was at length raised on the corner formed by the north side of Middle and the west side of King-street, on the spot now occupied by Henry Bradbury's store. Still the work went slowly on ; in May 1722, it was voted that the meeting-house frame should be covered and inclosed, and that the money granted to the town by the general court should be applied to discharge the expense of the meeting-house frame as far as it would go.1
A committee was raised Feb. 4, 1724, "to get the clapboards for the meeting-house at £4 per thousand to be paid out of the town stock," and March 9, 1725, Major Moody and Benj. York were chosen to agree with workmen to finish the outside of the meeting- house, and in August a tax was laid of £90 for that and other town purposes. Nothing however was done to the interior of the house except laying a floor ; it was not even glazed. In this situation, after more than five years from the commencement of the undertak- ing, was the house found by the Rev. Thomas Smith, who arrived here to preach June 23, 1725. In the course of the summer of 1726, it was finished outside and glazed, the glass having been presented
1 In 1722 the General Court, on petition of Dominicus Jordan on behalf of the inhabitants, granted £40 to the town to assist them in building the meet- ing house. The persons employed in the work were Peter Walton, Benja. Ingersoll, Mr. Millett and "Ensign Robert Pierce." It was offered as an in- ducement to the Legislature to make the grant toward building the meeting house, that the soldiers would have some advantage from it : the petition sets forth "that they have a minister among them and have begun a meeting house, but by reason of the troubles by the Indians, which have much impov- erished them, they are unable to finish said building ; and the rather because the soldiers in the public service will have some benefit therefrom."
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Meeting-house. [P. II.
by Gov. Wentworth of N. H. whose visit here as one of the com- missioners to treat with the Indians, gave him an opportunity to wit- ness the forlorn condition of the only house of public worship in this region. It was not however until February 1728, that a vote was passed for finishing the interior arrangements, " so far as the pulpit and the seats below for the people's conveniency of sitting." Thus long was this humble building reaching even the moderate accommo- dation of giving the people the conveniency of sitting down. They were not employed eight years in stretching a colonnade or elevating and ornamenting a pediment, for the exterior decoration, nor in gor- geous diplays of drapery and highly wrought workmanship to beguile the mind from its devotional contemplations ; but it was the effort of a poor and pious race to erect a mere shelter, where secured from the storm, they could offer up from the pure temple of their hearts, thanksgiving and praise. The style of this their first public building corresponded no doubt with their private dwellings, and probably as much superior to most of them as the means of the public were to those of any individual. There was not, we may safely conjecture, a two story house in town at that time.
The minister, for the accommodation of the people on the south side of Fore-river, preached at Purpooduck every third Sunday. The building used on these occasions was a log-house, which had been built for the common purpose of a garrison and a church, and is the only public edifice which we have known to have been ever plac- ed by the inhabitants upon the point. It stood on the high ground, west of where the fort now stands ; the burying-ground extended southerly to the shore of Simonton's cove. Seats and glass were voted to be put into this fabric in February 1728.
The arrival of Mr. Smith in 1725, who was then but 23 years old, commences a new era in the ecclesiastical affairs of the town. He graduated at Harvard College in 1720, and had commenced preaching in 1722 ; in 1723 he received a call to settle at Billing- ham in the county of Norfolk, which he declined. When he came to Falmouth he found Mr. Pierpont preaching here ; he was a chap- lain in the army, whose head quarters were on the Neck. The town "is represented by Mr. Smith to have been in a sad state, every object bore the marks of poverty and wretchedness. The popula- tion was principally made up of soldiers and fishermen ; the Indian
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Rev. Mr. Smith.
C. 2.]
war had not yet closed ; even the meeting house, upon which the people had exhausted their means, sightless windows, without seats or pulpit, a mere shell, presented to the mind of a young aspirant for fame but miserable encouragement. For such a man, brought up in Boston, then the largest town on this continent north of Mexico, to fix his destinies on this spot under such circumstances, required almost the zeal of an apostle and the courage of a martyr. That excellent man perceived here a large field for useful exertion; he remained preaching until the 5th of September, and at the pressing solicitation of the people returned again in November. The contribution on one Sabbath was £2.6. equal to $400 a year, a large sum in those days. On the 26 of April 1726, the people gave him an invitation to settle among them, and offered him a salary of £70, equal to $233 33, for the first year, besides his board and the contribution of strangers, and promised " to increase the same according to their ability and as their circumstances would allow, till he should be provi- ded with an honorable maintainance." He deliberated a long time on this call, still continuing to preach among them, and Jan. 23, 1727, gave an affirmative answer.1
This result was received by the people with great joy, and on the day that the reply was communicated, the town voted " to accept Mr. Smith's answer to settle with them, with all thankfulness, being universally satisfied therewithall," they also voted to supply him with fire wood, to pay his salary every six months, to clear and fence the three acre lot given him and also the three acre lot adjoining, granted for the ministry." They had previously voted to build him a house, " 40 feet long, 20 feet wide
1 Mr. Smith's acceptance. "Falmouth, Jan. 23, 1726-7. Gentlemen :- Sometime since, as a committee of this town you acquainted me with the choice the inhabitants had made of me to settle among them as their minister. Since which I have had time to take the great affair into the most deliberate and serious consideration, and after solemn address to heaven for counsel and direction, and the best advice of my friends, am determined to accept of this call and invitation, and do accordingly, with the most humble reliance on free grace, devote myself to the service of Christ in the ministry of the gospel among them, depending upon such a suitable and honorable provision for my support and maintainance, as by their free and generous proposals they have left me no room to doubt of. THOMAS SMITH."
To Major Samuel Moody, Esq. and
Mr. Benjamin York, to be communicated.
2 These two lots extended from Congress street to Back Cove, where the meeting house of the 1st parish now stands ; these lots appear to have been covered with wood, as was most of the Neck at that time.
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F
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Ecclesiastical Affairs. [P. II.
and 16 feet stud, with a convenient kitchen on the back side," and they selected for its situation a lot on the north side of Congress street, directly fronting King street, the very spot now occupied by the mansion house of the late Josiah Paine.
The ordination was appointed to take place on the 8th of March, and was anticipated with great interest, being the first event of the kind which had taken place in town or in this part of the country. " Major Moody was desired to entertain the messengers and minis- ters upon ordination day, the charge to be defrayed by the town, and John Sawyer desired to take care of their horses.""" " Persons were also invited to send in free-will offerings of provisions." Captain Dominicus Jordan and Left. Jordan, were appointed " to gather what provisions may be had at Spurwink ; Jonathan Cobb for Pur- pooduck, and Thomas Millett and Samuel Proctor for Casco side."
Agreeably to previous arrangements, the ordination took place on the 8th of March ; the churches of Berwick, Wells, York and Kitte- ry being present, and assisting by their delegates and pastors. Mr. Moody of York, made the first prayer ; Mr. Wise of Berwick preached the sermon and gave the right. hand of fellowship ; Mr. Newmarch of the first church in Kittery, gave the charge, and Mr. Rodgers of the second church in Kittery, now Elliot, made the con- cluding prayer. On the same day the church was formed and enter- ed into a covenant which was subscribed by Thomas Smith, Isaac Sawyer, Thomas Haskell, John Barber, Robert Means, Samuel Cobb, John Armstrong, Wm. Jeals? and Wm. Jemison. To this entry on the church records, Mr. Smith adds, " We are the first church that ever was settled to the eastward of Wells." The church was extremely poor ; at its first meeting July 10, 1727, a committee was appointed to gather something from among the inhabitants to defray the expense of the communion table on account of the pover- ty of the church. The first celebration of the Lord's supper by the church was on the 20th of August, at which about 30 communicants were present : Samuel Cobb was chosen the first deacon.
The next year Sept. 12, 1728, Mr. Smith was married to Sarah Tyng, daughter of Col. Tyng of Dunstable. On his return, he was
1 By this it would appear that they left their horses at Purpooduck, where Sawyer lived, near the ferry.
2 This name is variously spelt in the town books, Jeals, Gilles and Gyles,
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Rev. Mr. Smith.
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4
met at Scarborough by a number of his parishioners, who escorted him home and regaled him and his bride with "a noble supper," prepared for the occasion.1 The town was a long time finishing his dwelling-house ; we find as late as October 1732, an appropriation of £146. 14. 10. made for completing it. It was the best house in the village for many years ; as late as 1740, it contained the only papered room in town, and this, by way of distinction, used to be called " the papered room ;" the paper was put on with nails and not by paste.
1 Smith's Journal.
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Schools and Education.
[P. II.
CHAPTER 3.
Education-Schools and School-masters-Educated men-Pub- lic Library.
IN the first years after the revival of the town, the inhabitants were so much occupied in providing for the security of their estates and for their very existence, that but little thought or attention was bestowed on the education of their children. The earliest notice we have on this subject is from the records Sept. 15, 1729, eleven years after the incorporation of the town, when "the selectmen were requested to look out for a school-master to prevent the town's being presented." Their consideration was then aroused, it would seem, rather from fear of the law than a proper regard to the im- portance of the subject. The existing laws required every town containing fifty families to support one school-master constantly, and those containing 100 families to maintain a grammar school. It was not until 1726 that the number of families brought the town within the lowest provision of the statute ; it is therefore probable, con- sidering the poverty of the people, that no measures for public education had been taken previous to the time mentioned in the record : nor does it appear that any person was procured on that occasion.
The first notice we meet with of the actual employment of a teacher is in 1733, when Robert Bayley was hired at a salary of £70 a year, to keep six months upon the Neck, three months at Purpooduck and three months on the north side of Back Cove.1 The next year the places of his labor were varied and he was required to keep two months each on the Neck, at Purpooduck, Stroudwater, Spurwink, New Casco and Presumpscot, and his salary was raised to £75. In 1735, his services were divided
1 Robert Bailey was admitted a proprietor on the payment of £10 August 17, 1727, and in February following a house lot was granted to him on the South side of Middle-street, where Plumb-street has since been laid out. He probably came from Newbury where the Bailey family settled about 1642 .- The ancestor was John, who came from Chippenham, Eng. to Salisbury about 1639 with his son John, and died in Newbury, 1651. A John Bailey was admitted an inhabitant here Dec. 14, 1727, and Joseph in 1723.
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1
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Schools and Education.
C. 3.]
between the first and second parishes, seven months in the former and five in the latter.' In 1736, he received £6 extra as grammar school-master, and this is the first intimation we have of the estab- lishment of a grammar school in town, although it must have had the statute number of families for several years. The same year a Mr. Sewall kept here six months, and as no further notice is taken of Mr. Bailey it is probable that Mr. Sewall took his place. The next year Nicholas Hodge was employed, under a vote of the town to keep the grammar school, and the first parish were allowed the privilege of fixing the location on paying £20 toward the salary." Mr. Hodge was then a student at Harvard College, from which he graduated in 1739 ; he kept here again in the three years 1739 to 1741, while preparing for the ministry under the care of Mr. Smith : he preached for Mr. Smith in 1743. It is probable that in 1737 the grammar school became a distinct school, in which higher branches were taught than had been before practised, as in that year a person of liberal education had for the first time been employed. About this time, Samuel Stone kept a school in his house on the bank of Fore river near the foot of Centre-street : Thankful Poge, born in 1731, in a deposition which she has left behind her, says she went to him two summers some time before Capt. Breton was taken the first time.3 In 1745 £130 were voted " to pay the school master now among us," and the selectmen were authorised to pro- portion his time in the several districts according to taxes4 ; the same year £50 were raised by the town toward paying a grammar school-master, and the people on the Neck by making up his salary
'Purpooduck had then been set off as a secon 1 parish.
Mr. Hodge came from Newbury and was probably a relative of Phineas Jones one of our principal inhabitants, whose wife was a Hodge from that town.
· 3Stone was a boat builder by trade, he was admitted an inhabitant in 1727, and a house lot was granted him at the foot of Centre-street. He subsequent- ly moved to Manchester, Mass. where he died in 1778, leaving several chil- dren. Mrs. Poge was a daughter of Cox, who lived in a house which stood near where High-street now enters Fore-street, on the spot where the late Mr. Tinkham's house stands. There were then no streets opened in that quarter of the town. In going to school she says she went down a foot path and crossed the gulley on a string piece. This gulley was formed by water running from the fountain and the wet lands in that neighborhood and entered the river near where Mrs. Oxnard's house is.
4The currency at this time was old tenor, which was at a depreciation of seven to one ; upon this scale the salary of the school-master was humble indeed, not exceeding $80 in silver.
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Schools and Education. [P. II
were to have the school kept among them ; this favour was annually granted them until the division of the town. In the same year Ste- phen Longfellow, the first of the family who settled in town, and the ancestor of all of the name now among us, came here April 11, and opened a school in six days afterwards : it was probably the grammar school. He continued to be the principal instructor in town until he was appointed clerk of the court on the division of the county in 1760.1 In the early part of this time he occupied a building at the corner of School-street, he afterwards kept in his house which fronted the beach at the lower end of the town. The second year of his engagement his salary was £200. In 1747 £40, and in 1748 £60 were voted for a grammar school to be kept in that part of the town which would pay the remainder of the salary. In 1752 £100 lawful money were raised for schools, and £6. 13. 4. "were added to the Neck's proportion" to assist the inhabitants there to support a grammar school : the same sum was annually granted to the Neck for five or six years for the same purpose.2
In 1753, John Wiswall appears to have been keeping school here. Mr. Smith under date of January 25 of this year says, " our two school-masters, (Mr. Longfellow and Mr. Wiswall) opened their schools on Monday 22d." Mr. Wiswall was at this time qualifying himself to preach ; he graduated at Harvard College in 1749 ; but when he came here and where from we are unable to ascertain.3
'Mr. Longfellow was grandson of Wm. Longfellow, who early settled in that part of Newbury now called Byfield, and was a merchant of respectabil- ity and property : his son Stephen born in 1681, married Ann Sewall of New- bury, and was father of the Stephen who came here. The subject of our present notice was born in Newbury, Feb. 1723, and graduated at H. C. 1742. He was for many years one of the most active, useful and intelligent men in town ; he was clerk. of the first parish twenty-three years, town clerk twenty-two years, Register of Probate and clerk of the Judicial Courts six- teen years from 1760. He married Tabitha Bragdon of York in 1749, who died in 1777, by whom he had Stephen, Samuel, William and one daughter married to Capt. John Stephenson in 1771. He died at Gorham in 1790, leaving to his posterity the well earned reputation of sound morals and strict integrity.
"The currency had now been restored to a, sound state ; the paper had all been called in by an act which went into effect March 31, 1750, and the cir- culating medium was gold and silver, consequently the appropriation for schools was equal to $333,33.
3Mr. Wiswall was ordained over the society in New-Casco Nov. 3, 1756. In 1762 he became deranged and continued in this condition about six months. In 1764 he changed his religious sentiments, declared for the church of Eng- land and accepted the call of the Episcopalians on the Neck to preach to them.
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Schools and Education. ,
C. 3.]
- Peter T. Smith son of the Rev. Thomas Smith kept a school on the Neck in 1755, he began Jan. 16 ; in the December following he moved to Windham, where he was afterwards settled in the min- istry1 : he graduated at Harvard College in 1753. Mr. Wallace afterwards kept a school five or six years in a one story school house which stood on the corner of Middle and School-streets ; he had a wife and lived in the same building ; he came from England where he had been employed as a draughtsman in the Navy Yard at Dept- ford. In 1756, Jonathan Webb came here from Boston, and prob- ably soon after that time opened a school, which he continued to keep several years ; some of our old people can still remember the discipline of this teacher. He kept at one time in King-street, next above the town-house, and afterwards in a small building perched on the steep bank where the Mariner's church now stands.2 At another time he kept in his house which stood on Congres-sstreet near where Wilmot-street joins it. He graduated at Harvard Col- lege in 1754 ; in 1763 he married Lucy, the eldest daughter of Brigadier Preble, but had no issue by her. He died soon after the war commenced, having retired from school-keeping a number of years before his death.3 He was succeeded by Moses Holt who graduated at Harvard College in 1767, but who was cut off in the midst of his labours and promise by consumption in 1772 aged 27.
We may reasonably conclude that two schools conducted by male teachers were regularly kept upon the Neck from about 1750, that Mr. Smith succeeded Mr. Wiswall, and that Mr. Webb followed Mr. Smith. In 1760 the time of which we are speaking, the num- ber of families upon the Neck was about 165, furnishing as we may fairly estimate, a population of about 1600 : Besides the male schools there was one kept for smaller children by the ancient dame, Mrs. Clark, who lived in Plumb-street. The severity of her disci-
1In 1757 he kept school and preached at Weymouth.
2The building rested on piles a little distance from the street, the passage to it was over a plank platform-He was called by the boys pithy Webb fromn a practice he had of putting the pith of the quill in his mouth when he cut it ; Edward Preble, afterwards the distinguished Capt. went to him, and while there nearly broke him of this habit, though at his own bitter cost, by render- ing the pith on one occasion, very unpalatable.
3Mr. Webb, after he gave up his school, for which he appears not to have been very well qualified, kept boarders; the elder John Adams, when he at- tended the court here, which he regularly did for several years previous to the revolution, always boarded with him.
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Schools and Education. [P. II.
pline and her harsh manners still dwell in the memories of some who have survived to our day.
In 1761, a great excitement was produced in town by the conduct of a school-master by the name of Richmond.1 He was an Irish- man and very severe in his discipline ; but this cannot have been the sole ground of complaint against him ; and it is evident that he would not have ventured to return had he not been supported by a party in his favor. In 1761, he was carried before Enoch Freeman on a warrant, and bound over to appear before the Court of General Sessions " to answer his being presented for setting up and keeping school in Falmouth without the approbation of the selectmen." Alexander Ross and Dr. Coffin were his sureties.2 We learn noth- ing more of him after this time and conclude he was not able to withstand the storm that was raised against him.3 The next persons we find employed in this responsible duty were David Wyer and Theophilus Bradbury, who were then studying law, and were both admitted to practice in the Common Pleas in 1762 : Mr. Bradbu- ry graduated at Harvard College in 1757, and Mr. Wyer in 1758. Mr. Bradbury kept in Plumb-street in a house now standing, next below the brick house on the east side of the street. They were probably not long engaged in this employment, as after their admis- sion to the bar, they entered at once into full professional business, being at that time the only lawyers in the county.
In 1762, the first Parish, which then included the whole of an- cient Falmouth, except the districts of Purpooduck and New Casco,' was divided into four school districts, two of which were upon the Neck, the third embraced Capisic, Stroudwater, Saccarappa and Deer- hill, and the fourth Back Cove, and the rest of the parish not inclu- ded in the other districts.4 On the same occasion it was voted that
' " Things remain in a dismal situation about the school-master Richmond, a very worthless fellow, by means of which the peace of the neighborhood of the Neck is broken up and dreadful quarrelings occasioned. The old select- men sent him out of town, but he returned and kept school at - Smith's Jour. March 9, 1761.
?His name was John Montague Richmond.
3Lyon, another "old countryman" kept school in Fore-street, near Clay Cove, about the commencement of the revolution ; he was an old man and very severe in his discipline, which rendered him unpopular. At this time and for many years after, boys and girls went to the same school.
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