USA > Maine > The history of the state of Maine; from its first discovery, A. D. 1602, to the separation, A. D. 1820, inclusive, Vol. I > Part 42
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64
$ Shurte is supposed to have died at Pemaquid, A. D. 1690.
421
OF MAINE.
CHAP. XV.]
cot, Sept. 5th, in the 17th year of the reign of our Sovereign A. D. 1665. Lord the King, Anno Domini 1665."
They erected the whole territory into a county, by the name of Cornwall ; named the Sheepscot plantation Dartmouth or New-Dartmouth; and settled the dividing line between it and Pemaquid.
Next, they summoned the inhabitants in the several settle- ments, to appear and submit to his Majesty's government, with- in the Duke's patent. Only twenty-nine however,* appeared and took the oath of allegiance, at this term ;- probably a minor part of the whole number of men between Sagadahock and Pe- nobscot.
In the construction and establishment of civil government they appointed a chief constable, three magistrates or justices of the peace, and a recorder. The justices were Nicholas Raynal of Sagadahock, Thomas Gardiner of Pemaquid, and William Dyer of Dartmouth, being, as the commissioners said, the ablest. and ' best men to be found in those places.' The same oath was administered to these as to the justices appointed in the Province of Maine, to wit ;- You as justice of the peace do swear, that you will do equal right to the poor and rich, after the laws and customs of England, according to your cunning and power. You shall not be of counsel to any party. You shall not let or hinder for gift or other cause, but well and truly you shall do your ofice of justice of the peace. Three justices in Maine, viz. Courts and Henry Joscelyn, Robert Jordan, and George Mountjoy, assisted legal pro- ess in the by the preceding three, were constituted a Court, and directed Duke's pa- tent. to hold sessions for the trial of all causes, " till further order." Their jurisdiction southward or westward, was limited by the river Sagadahock, including about thirty or forty families upon the islands and eastern side of the river, formerly within the Plymouth patent. But the Commissioners being aware, proba-
* In Sagadahock-William Friswell, Richard Hammond, John Miller, Robert Morgan, Thomas Parker, Marcus Parsons, Thomas Watkins, John White .- In " Sheepscot"-Wm. Dole, Wm. Dyer, (Esq.) Christopher Dyer, Nathaniel Draper, Thomas Gents, Wm. James, Wm. Markes, John Mason. Thomas Mercer, Walter Phillips, [Clerk,] Moses Pike, Robert Scott, Andrew Stalger, John Taylor, John White .- In Pemaquid-Thomas Al- bridge, [Elbridge,] Edmund Arrowsmith, George Buckland, Henry Champ- ness, Thomas Gardiner .-- of Arrowosick -- Nicholas Raynal .- Sullivan, p. 287.
422
THE HISTORY
[VOL. 1.
A. D. 1665. bly, of the royal commission to Governor Temple,* and of the charter to Beauchamp and Leverett, seem not to have exercised any authority northwardly beyond Muscongus river.t In try- ing any cause, civil, ecclesiastical or criminal, if the justices were equally divided in opinion, Henry Joscelyn was entitled to a double or casting vote.
The chief constable had the power to appoint deputies ; and the following precepts will show us the forms of process, also how he was authorized to act.
To the Constable on the eastward side of the Kennebeck river or his Deputy .- Greeting.
By virtue hereof, you are required in his Majesty's name, and under the authority of his Highness, the Duke of York, to ap- prehend the body or goods of C. Lawson, and take bond of him to the value of £120, with sufficient surety or sureties, for his personal appearance at a special court, to be held at Arrowsick, the 27th of this present November, then and there to answer to the complaint of E. Dawner, for not yielding a debt due by bill, bearing date the 3d day of June, 1665. Hereof you are not to fail, as you will answer it at your peril ; and so make true return under your hand. Dated this 1st November, 1665.
NICHOLAS RAYNAL, Jus. Pacis.
The officers return .- November, 1665.
I have attached the body of C. Lawson, and have taken bail for his appearance at the next Court, to answer to the complaint of Ed. Dawner in an action of the case : This is a true re- turn.t RICHARD LEMONS, Constable.
These imperfect sketches, are the prominent features of the civil administration, undertaken to be framed by these Commis- sioners.§ Short sighted statesmen-unacquainted with the genius
* Hutch. Coll. p. 244-5.
t " Governor Dungan, agent of the Duke of York, removed many Dutch " families from the banks of the Hudson to his New Province on the " Sheepscot. They tarried there until the settlements were broken up by " the wars which were soon after commenced by the savages .- Sullivan, p. 291.
# Sullivan, p. 291.
§ The laws of the Duke's Province, collected by Governor Nichols, and confirmed by the Duke, have been examined by the compiler of this his- tory ; but he can find in them no particular mention of his eastern pa- tent.
Defects in measures.
423
OF MAINE.
CHAP. XV.]
of the people, their necessities, and the political remedies A. D. 1665. needed, they formed no regular system of government ; their whole management giving full proof of their inadequacy to the magnitude of the trust to which they had been commissioned. No provision was made for legislation, trials by jury, military defence, taxation, religious instruction, or the education of youth. Though they found settlements scattered to a wide ex- tent, some of which were more than forty years old, and also a population probably of three hundred families,* who treated their measures and authority with the utmost civility ; their ill-nature prompted them to represent the whole as only " three small plan- Commis- tations belonging to his royal highness," viz. " on the northeast of port. sioners re- " Kennebeck, on Sheepscot river and on Pemaquid ;" 'the ' largest of which,' they said, 'did not contain more than thirty ' houses, and all of them mean.' The people, whose allotments were labor and poverty, being strangers to the pleasures and ben- efits of society, and strong in the hopes of finding the commis- sioners their benefactors, were represented by them, to be mere fishermen, and fugitives from justice, unused to the restraints of government. Listening to an instance of lasciviousness related to them, they gave it a turn of ridicule upon the planters generally, by stating in their report, f afterwards made, that 'some of them ' have as many shares in a woman, as they have in a fishing ' boat.'
It is said the Commissioners established the form of an ecclesi- astical constitution, which, though cast in an episcopal mould, was remarkable for its simplicity and liberal principles. Assurances were given the inhabitants, that their possessions and rights should not be disturbed .¿ But no adequate redress of wrongs was pro- vided ; and in all conveyances, as well by the planters as by the Duke's agents, § it appears the policy was revived of incumbering them with quit-rents.
But the unequal numbers of the inhabitants, compared with the natives, and some apprehensions of a rupture, induced the Commissioners to negotiate a treaty with the Sagamores, which contained provisional articles, too judicious and memorable not
A treaty with the Indians.
* Eighty-four families in 1630 .- S. Davis' Report .- And 175 families in 1673 .- Sullivan, p. 391.
t See this report .- Hutch. Coll. p. 124-5.
Į Sullivan, p. 170-188.
§ Sullivan, p. 162-3-374.
424
THE HISTORY
[VOL. I.
A. D. 1665. to be mentioned. For it was agreed, " that if any mischief should happen to be done either by the English or Indians"-re- dress was to be sought by complaint to the Courts, if an Indian were the sufferer, and to the Sagamores, when the English were injured :- and never were they, on either side, to seek revenge by acts of hostility. This, if religiously observed, 'might have ' been, as Mr. Hubbard* remarks, a perfect preventive of blood- ' shed.'
Sheepscot Records.
The " Sheepscot records" sometimes called the " Records of eastern claims of lands," which were commenced under the Commissioners by Walter Phillips, contained a registry of grants under the Duke, of Indian deeds and other conveyances, and were continued about fifteen years. Afterwards, the book was removed to the Secretary's office in Boston, and was considered to be of great authority, till it was lost.t
Commis- siorers at Casco and York.
Early in October, the Commissioners returned to York. In passing or returning through Casco, they opened a Court, and among other arbitrary proceedings, pronounced all land-titles ob- tained from the Lygonian proprietor and all Indian deeds, the merest nullities. The avowal of such a sentiment, though it fanned the fire of indignation, seems to have been apprehended ; for it is said that Massachusetts previously confirmed all the lands in Falmouth to the inhabitants. Taking umbrage at every oppos- ing measure of that colony, the Commissioners were ready to hear any complaint against her. The famous John Bonythont showed them a warrant which ordered him to be arrested and
* Hubbard's N. E. 385 .- His Indian Wars, p. 297.
¡ It is said that Phillips, to avoid the Indian tomahawk, fled to Charles- ton, Massachusetts, A. D. 1680, where he died .- It is supposed the records were consumed by fire when the Boston Court House was burnt. Simon Frost of Kittery says, in his depositions of June 2, 1765, that 25 years be- fore when Deputy Secretary, under J. Willard, Esq. he took copies from that book ; and when the Court House was burnt, in 1748, he was Repre- sentative from Kittery, and with others made search for the records soon after, but they could not be found ; nor have they since been seen.
# It is not known when or where this troublesome man died. He was furious, obstinate and unpopular. The grave stones of this man show him to have been interred at Rendezvous Point on the east side of the Saco-upon which some unknown hand inscribed this ill-natured couplet.
" Here lies Bonython the Sagamore of Saco.
" He liv'd a rogue, and died a knave, and went to Hockemocko.
425
CHAP. XV.] OF MAINE.
carried to Boston, " dead or alive ;" merely as he said, because A. D. 1665. he would not bow to her government.
count of the
At York, where they prolonged their visit, they pretended that the eastern inhabitants and a great Sachem also, had peti- tioned the king to receive them under his protecting hand, and appoint Sir Robert Carr their Governor. They gave quite a ro- Their ac- mantic account of the Duke's eastern country. They repre- Duke's sented, that the numerous " islands, harbors and outlets, upon Province. " the coast were richly stored with great fish, oysters and lob- "sters ;" that the interior abounded with " wild ducks, geese, " deer," and other game, and also with " strawberries, raspber- ries, gooseberries, barberries, several sorts of bilberries in their seasons ;" and that they found " several kinds of oaks, and " pines,-and the chesnut and walnut trees, sometimes for four or " five miles together."*
To oppose them in the exercise of authority, the General Court despatched Messrs Danforth, Lusher and Leverett, to hold a term of Yorkshire Court in October.f But they were stopped at Piscataqua, Oct. 10, by a sharp letter sent to them from Kit- tery by Carr, who ordered them to desist from their purpose, and proceed no farther .- They therefore returned to Boston and were soon followed by the Commissioners.
When they arrived, they were charged by the General Court, with disturbing the public peace; and were requested to meet a committee for the purpose of a conference .- No, not a word need pass, replied Carr ;- but remember, the king's pardon of the late rebellion is conditional, and the authors of the opposi- tion among you must expect the punishment awarded the rebels in England-and you well know their fate.}
Here all intercourse with them terminated. Recalled by the 1666. king, § they in a few months, departed the colony,-at a time They are when the public attention was arrested and occupied by the news departi of war, declared by the French king against England. ||
recalled and
In the first year of this war, extensive preparations were made War with by the British cabinet, for the reduction of Canada ; and no France. other conquest, on this side of the Atlantic, could give equal
* Hutch. Coll. p. 424. + 3 Mass. Rec. p. 208.
#1 Hutch. Hist. p. 228-9. §1 Belk. N. H. p. 97 .- Hub. N. E. p. 586.
" A war to aid Holland-against England .- 5 Hume p. 440. VOL. L
41
426
THE HISTORY
[VOL. I.
A. D. 1665. occasion for general joy. The king required Massachusetts to take the lead among the colonies in the enterprize ; and Gover- nor Nichols expressed the greatest anxiety for the speedy move- ment of her troops. He said it was reported that the French had 700 men under marching orders against Albany ;* and nothing but the arms or enmity of the Mohawks,t while remaining un- subdued, could form any barrier, to impede the progress of the French and Canadian forces.
Octoberi
But the enlistments were not completed and the necessary preparations ready till October. It was then too late and wholly impracticable, in the opinion of the General Court and of Gov- ernor Temple, an experienced officer who had been consulted, to march a body of troops over rocky mountains, and through rugged deserts, a distance of 1,400 miles against a formidable enemy ; }-and the campaign was not undertaken.
Maine and Sagada- hock.
Never was a country more open and exposed to the incur- sions of an enemy, than the region was at that time, between Piscataqua and Nova Scotia. The inhabitants, scattered and defenceless, were without fortifications, without arms or military stores, and without even any common bond of union. All the settlements upon a seacoast, 200 miles in extent, were situated near the best harbors, tempting in every thing except poverty, to the visits of invaders. The enemy on their rear, who had by this time acquired a singular missionary influence among the jeal- ous savages, hated the puritan planters, and especially coveted this eastern country. Nor was this all. Distracted with political dissensions, the eastern people had none to help or protect them ; though it were well known how many claimed to control and rule them. In three or four years, all traces of the king's com- missioners were obliterated, a few monumental evils excepted ; and Massachusetts was evidently the only power, to which the inhab- itants could look with any prospect of assistance,§ either in war or peace.
* " M. de Courcelles, appointed Governor of New-France, transported " the regiment of Carignan Salueres to Canada."-1 Holmes' A. Ann. p. 396. -And with it came Baron de Castine.
t The French established a peace with the Mohawks, A. D. 1667.
13 Mass. Rec. p. 268.
§ Massachusetts at this time had a militia, consisting " of 4,000 foot and 400 horse."-1 Holmes' A. Ann. p. 304.
427
OF MAINE.
CHAP. XV.]
Happily for them the war was short, though its consequences A. D. 1667. formed a lamentable train of evils. A cessation of hostilities in the spring was followed by two treaties, which the English con- 'Treaty of cluded at Breda, July 31, 1667, one with France and the other 31. Breda, July with Holland. In these negotiations, the English agreed to sur- render Nova Scotia to the French ; and Holland resigned to England, the Dutch colony at the Hudson.
The recession or return of the Acadian Province to France, was generally lamented throughout New-England .* Indeed, since Sir Thomas was the territorial proprietor, as well as the Governor, it was a great question among statesmen, and perhaps the English envoy himself doubted, if the crown could cede any other right than that of sovereignty or the government. For the cession was not in the treaty itself, but through the pressure and influence of the French embassy, was subsequently made an appendant article.
Except under the administration of Governor Temple, the The French Acadian French had been always disagreeable to their New- and English Colonists. England neighbors. For their motives of action, their habits of life and thought, their pursuits and plans in business, and in fact, all the qualities and shades of their character, differed as widely from those of the English, as the two people were unlike in their language, their religious tenets and their political sentiments. In short, they agreed in nothing, except in the forms and gifts of nature. Let a bigoted catholic, ever servile to the dictates of Jesuit priests, a slavish subject, believing in the divine right of kings, a Frenchman devoted to savage society, the chase, the wigwam or an Indian wife, be contrasted with puritan piety, poli- tics, intelligence and taste for refinements; and one will not find it difficult to understand the causes of mutual dislike, nor to de- termine on which side were enmity and the avenger. Among the disciples of papacy, all protestants were esteemed heretics, whose liberty, wealth and life itself, according to their creed, it was no sin to sacrifice.
The Indians schooled by the same spiritual teachers, imbibed a similar disposition, and were easily bloated with the same opin- dians. ions. The original estrangement and malignity of the eastern and western tribes towards each other, were observed to be grad-
* Hatch. Coll. p. 489.
The In-
428
THE HISTORY
[VOL. 1.
A. D. 1667. ually yielding to the vibrations of intercourse. Their natural cunning, sharpened by necessity, prompted them to trespass and pilfer at a distance from home. Hence, the people were satis- fied, that the Eastern Indians were the perpetrators of certain mischiefs, committed in the autumn of 1667, among the domes- tic animals, and in the cornfields and meadows of Hadley upon Connecticut river ; and the sufferers sent to Robinhood, a chief Sagamore at Kennebeck, demanding redress and threatening him and his tribe with the utmost severities, if the offences were repeated. To promote amity with them, license was at length given to the traders in fur and in peltries, to sell unto Indian friends, guns and ammunition .*
The proprietary rights of Temple to the territory of Nova Scotia, no one in justice could deny. But perceiving it was the determination of the French to obtain it, and the agreement of the English to surrender it, he entered into a negotiation with his master's ministry upon the subject. In consideration of a re- linquishment, he exacted a reimbursement of the purchase money, and the expenses bestowed upon fortifications, and incurred in other improvements. The total estimate was found to be £16,200,-a sum which the crown agreed to pay him.t
A. D 1668 to 1669. Nova Scotia resigned to France.
Immediately afterwards, in February 1668, the articlet of cession was tacked to the treaty of Breda, and all Acadia, with- out any specification as to boundaries, including by name, " St. John's, Port-Royal, La Heve, Cape Sable, and Pentagoet," or Penobscot, as being parts of the Province, was ordered into the possession of the Frenchi. Not being paid the money, he delay- ed the surrender, till by his Majesty's special command, in 1669,6 he was forced to submit, without the consideration promised him, which he never received; and Capt. Wibourne at Penobscot, and Richard Walker, the proprietary's Lieutenant-Governor, made at last a formal surrender of the whole, to Mons. le Grand Fontaine. It was a hardship sensibly felt by Sir Thomas ; and as it occurred just before his death which was in 1674, he devis- ed the money, or otherwise his interest in the Province, to his nephew William Nelson and his heirs. But being unable to avail
* 3 Mass. Rec. p. 269-272.
+ Palairet, p. 18.
Į Chalmers, p. 393. See the article in appendix, post.
Brit. Emp. in America, p. 22 .- 1 Hutch. Hist. p. 237.
429
OF MAINE.
CHAP. XV.]
himself of any advantage from the bequest, Nelson transferred A. D. 1668, it [A. D. 1730] to Samuel Waldo of Boston, who applied to the to 1669. crown either to pay him the money, award him the Province, or grant him an equivalent in other American lands .* Nothing however was allowed him, and his claim sank into oblivion.
It is said, the first French Governor was M. de Bourg ;f French ru- and after him Mons. Denys was appointed Lt. Governor in Aca- lers of Nova Scotia. dia, who resided in the country thirty years ; and in 1672, pub- lished a short history of it at Paris. The French occupied the country from Cape Breton to Penobscot; and built stockaded forts at the latter place, at Port-Royal and at the river St. Johns.§
In returning to the administration of government, instituted by A. D. 1666, the king's Commissioners, we find that within the Province previ- Affairs of 1667, 1668. ously bisected into two divisions, by a partition line through Ken- Maine. nebunk river, the courts, established consisted of four, the Gen- eral Assembly, Courts of Common Pleas, Courts of Quarter Sessions, and single Justice Courts for the trial of causes under 40s. by a jury of seven men. The first had sessions annually in May or June at Saco ; the second three times, and the third four times in a year in each division, at York and at Falmouth. Offences were presented by grand juries, and facts determined by juries of trials. At a court holden at Casco for the eastern division, in July 1666, by Henry Joscelyn, William Phillips, Francis Hooke, Edward Rishworth, and Samuel Wheelwright, styled the " Justices of the peace appointed by special commission from the Rt. Hon. Sir Robert Carr, Lt. Col. George Cartwright and Samuel Maverick Esq." it was ordered, that the selectmen of Falmouth should have the oversight of children and servants and correct such as were disobedient ; that George Mountjoy have power to administer oaths, join parties in marriage, and see if the weights and measures in town were according to the king's standard at Winchester. The sale of liquors to the Indians was prohibited :- non-attendance at public worship, sabbath-breaking, and profanity, were made punishable by a justice of the peace.
* Palairet, p. 19. + Hutch. Coll. p. 489-548.
# Mass. Letter Book, p. 104. After him Manival was Governor. § 1 Brit. Dom. in Am. p 246. 1 Holmes' A. Ann. p. 399, 404.
430
THE HISTORY
[VOL. I.
A. D. 1666, 1667, 1658.
The courts when holding their terms in York, were evidently guided by the laws previously received from Massachusetts ; and the last General Assembly under the new government, was holden at Saco, in May 1688 ; after which the people sought to be un- der the jurisdiction of Massachusetts .*
* 1 Maine Hist. Soc. Coll. p. 117-126 .- George Cleaves died about 1666, much embarrassed in his pecuniary affairs. Henry Joscelyn, being great- ly in debt to Joshua Scottow of Boston, made a conveyance to him, in 1666, of the Cammock patent at Black-point, except his homestead, and an adjoining tract ;- upon which purchase the grantee afterwards resided.
431
OF MAINE.
CHAP. XVI.]
CHAPTER XVI.
Political confusion in Maine-Appointment of Commissioners by Massachusetts to settle the affairs there-Governor Nichols' op- position-The Commissioners visit York-Altercations between them and the Justices-Massachusetts resumes the government of Maine-Appointment of officers and courts of justice-John and Henry Joscelyn-State of the eastern Province-Re-survey and extent of the Massachusetts' patent, eastward-The county of Devonshire established-Its officers and regulations-Peace with the Dutch-A new patent to the Duke of York-Courts in Maine-The provincial militia and population-Taxes-Happy union of Massachusetts and Maine-Claim of Gorges and Ma- son-Visit of Edward Randolph-His representations-The agents of Massachusetts at the court of England-Their instruc- tions-Decision by a committee of Privy Council-Maine pur- chased by Massachusetts.
AT the end of three or four years, after the king's Commis- A. D. 1666, sioners were recalled, the affairs of Gorges' Province relapsed 1667. Maine in a into lamentable confusion .* His partisans entertained no great confused affection for this new non-descript administration ; nor did he state. himself give it any special support. The Justices appointed were not the most popular men. In their attempts to discharge their duties, the experiment was unavailing ;- for numbers called in question the validity of their authority, and the lawfulness of the power, which they were endeavoring to exercise. Many hearts beat high for a return of the prosperous days, enjoyed while connected with Massachusetts ; and the principal men be- sought her government, to reassume the jurisdiction of the Pro- vince.t
The General Court, at their session in May 1668, observing the present to be the third year since any member had appeared from Maine, and finding a restoration of political order, and a Court.
A. D. 1668. Its condition considered by the York
* 1 Hutch. Hist. p. 238 .- The General Court said, they were in a state of " anarchy."-Mass. Rec .- Hub. N. E. p. 593.
t The last General Court holden under authority of the king's Commis- sioners, sat at Saco, May 29, 1663 .- 1 Coll. Maine Hist. Soc. p. 126.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.