USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Wiscasset > Wiscasset in Pownalborough; a history of the shire town and the salient historical features of the territory between the Sheepscot and Kennebec rivers > Part 6
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It is not known at what date Williamson became an officer in the militia. His arrival and imprisonment at Quebec in 1747 was noted in these words:
April 26 .- Capt. Jonathan Williamson was brought to Prison: He was taken at a new Town on Sheepscot River.
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Early History of Wiscasset
In 1757 he was captain of the Wiscasset militia, consisting of 110 men resi- dent in the District of Wiscasset, Jeremy Squam Island and Sheepscot, out- side of Newcastle line.
Coming now to Captain Williamson's service in civil capacities, we find that when, pursuant to a warrant issued by Samuel Denny, justice of the peace, the inhabitants of the town qualified by law to vote in town meetings met at the garrison at Wiscasset on the twenty-fifth of June, 1760, being the first meeting of this town, Jonathan Williamson was chosen town clerk and one of the selectmen. The other selectmen then chosen were John Fair- field and Michael Sevey, all residents in this section of the new town, who also acted as assessors. Of the offices to which he was then elected, he, by successive re-elections, held that of town clerk for thirteen years and that of selectman for fourteen years, during which period he on several occasions acted as moderator. He was one of the selectmen in the year 1766 when the General Court required the sheriff of the county and the selectmen of Pownalborough to make
A return and true Representation of the .... Town with Regard to the Number of Houses & Inhabitants &c, ...
His signature may be seen on the original return, by which return it appears that he was then living in a one-story log house, having two rooms with fire-places and eight squares of sash glass. Such was the humble domi- cile of the first selectman of this town.
He served on many important committees and when, in 1764, the town
Voted that the sum of One hundred and fifty Pounds be raised to be laid out on the House for the Publick Worship of God in sd Town
he together with John Gatchel, Job Averell, Thomas Rice, and Michal Sevey were the committee therefor; in 1766, Jonathan Williamson, Thomas Rice, and Michal Sevey were a committee "to Provide a Minister for the Town." In 1768, when the town acted upon a proposal to divide into par- ishes, he was one of the committee to apply to the General Court to get it effected. In 1771, he was one of a committee of five to number and appraise the pews in the meeting-house, and in 1772 to procure preaching; and when, on the ninth day of March, 1773, the town
Voted that the Town chuse a committee to take into Consideration a letter sent to the Selectmen of the Town from Boston Relating to the Infringements made on the Constitutional Rights of this Province and the other Provinces in America
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Wiscasset in Pownalborough
he, together with Thomas Rice, Esq., Mr. Abiel Wood, Mr. John Page, and Mr. Timothy Langdon, were made a committee therefor.
The reply drafted by that committee, accepted by the town in town meet- ing, spread in full upon its records and sent to the Boston committee, runs as follows:
TO THE COMMITTEE OF CORRESPONDENCE &C AT BOSTON
Gentlemen:
We acknowledge the receipt of your printed letter with a pamphlet in which you have stated our rights as Christians and as Colonists, and enumerated sundry infringements made on those rights. We sincerely thank you for your vigilance and care of our com- mon privileges, and hope you will give further warning if the dangers increase. Our infant state and the great distance from the metropolis of the Province we think may well apologize for our being thus late in returning an answer to your letter. The same reason will also induce us to be modest in our reply. We think it our duty however to offer our sentiments in this matter, if modestly, yet with so much boldness and sense of right as to discover ourselves not wholly unworthy the freedom we are contending for.
We profess ourselves friends to Government rightly understood and practised; for from thence the most important blessings of life are derived and insured to us; and to the English constitution in particular, as we apprehend there is such a nice prerogative in the Crown and liberty in the People as will, without encroachments on either side, render both honorable easy and happy. "Tis said power is of an encroaching nature. If so there is much greater reason to fear the Crown will arrogate to itself a more exten- sive prerogative than was defined in the original compact than that the people will claim those privileges that do not of right belong to them, as that is under the care of persons only, whose sole business it is to watch over, nurse and defend it with the ad- vantage of the Nation's purse and honor to aid and support it; these are in the hands of the many, naturally undesigning and quiet, and without the means and opportunity of extending them. How highly esteemed by the People then should they be who have generally exerted themselves in stating, defining and defending their rights and liber- ties? This,-to the Town of Boston,-this, Gentlemen, you have done.
There are in every plan of Government, certain stamina, certain vitals and essentials which render it what it is, and which cannot be altered or touched without destroying it. Not by the supreme authority of the Nation itself; for these, being the ground and spring of what power they possess, in the same proportion as these are removed or al- tered their power is diminished if not wholly annihilated by the first touch,-Yea we think they cannot by the majority of the Nation personally voting, without, at the same time, entirely discharging the minor from their compact and leaving them at liberty to remove themselves and effects into any other place or Government they may chuse, even to the ruin of those they leave behind.
There are also certain natural rights and privileges which every individual is pos-
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Early History of Wiscasset
sessed of, and which he neither does or can give up for the sake of Government in any form whatever,-one for instance is liberty of conscience to worship God in the way he thinks most agreeable to him. The state that enacts any law interfering with the dic- tates of conscience well instructed, arrogates to itself a power never given it by any or all the individuals of which it is composed, and consequently those who are aggrieved thereby may with justice, if not contend for their rights, yet remove themselves and effects from under the jurisdiction of such states; and no sooner have they done this than their allegiance to such State is at an end. Allegiance is a relative term, and like kingdoms and commonwealths is local and has its bounds. Upon this footing our Ancestors were justified in leaving their native country and seeking for peace of conscience in this then lonely and uncultivated wilderness, where they might worship their maker accord- ing to the dictates of their consciences without the interposition of any earthly power whatever. We doubt not our Forefathers soon as they landed here considered them- selves as beyond the jurisdiction of the supreme authority of the realm of England and without the dominion of its King in any capacity whatever, for if these were not their sentiments we must think them such children in knowledge as to imagine they could avoid an oppression answering from the laws of Nature by removing from one part of its jurisdiction to another. Had they tarried at home, their friends, their pleasant habita- tions, worldly comforts would have been some compensation, at least some alleviation to their religious disquietudes, but here they must have felt all the weight of ecclesiastick oppression without one alleviating circumstance,-Yea greatly increased by the fears of a savage enemy. Death in a thousand shapes.
Every right has its origin, as every effect has its cause, but whence the right of the King of England to this land, or the Nation in conjuction with him before our Ances- tors settled here, could be derived, is hard to tell. Was it by descent, or by purchase, or by conquest, or by the first discovery? We believe by neither of these. The subjects of the King of England were perhaps the subjects of the first Christian Prince that dis- covered this land, but it was then inhabited by a People independent, free and happy. But they were Heathen! Does it then follow that they had no property in what they possessed? Does being Christians, either nominal or real, give a man or a Nation a right to take away the property of others that were not so? Or can we supose the followers of the Great Founder of the Christian religion who himself expressly declared his King- dom was not of this world, because they were His disciples, have so easy and expeditious a way of acquiring property? If, then, the claim of the King or Nation to this land when our Ancestors arrived here was merely ideal, and that they had a right under their particular circumstances to withdraw themselves from the society to which they be- longed, does it not follow, that upon their landing here they were an entire independent State? Their weak and defenceless circumstances and the dangers surrounding them naturally led them to seek the aid and protection of some foreign power. For this they applied to the King of England, and by solemn compact and agreement obtained the promise of his aid, with a confirmation of many valuable liberties and privileges, on con- dition that they would consent to hold their lands of him in free and common socage with some other marks of subjection. The evidence of which compact and agreement
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Wiscasset in Pownalborough
we take to be the Charter of the Province. By this then, all the requirements of our King ought to be tried :- this ought to be the measure and rule of his conduct towards us and of our duty and obedience towards him. Many other immunities were derived from a higher source. Nevertheless we have undoubted right to all the liberties and privileges therein granted, the abridgment of the least of which we may justly complain of as a grievance.
There is a certain determinate relation subsisting between the British Nation and its King and this Province, to discover which, seems to us the most sure and ready way to put an end to our complaints, that will point out our duties founded in and resulting from that relation, then nothing but honest minds will be wanting to pursue them.
Thus, Gentlemen, we have given you our idea of the relation we bear to the Mother Country, which seems to be that of two distinct States once entirely independent but now under solemn covenant and agreement with each other, and of the rule by which we try our stipulated rights; and we think that whatever is required of us con- trary to the letter and spirit of the Charter, is required without right. Whatever is therein given up we lay no claim to, provided the contents be fulfilled on the other part.
After saying this much we think it needless to give you a detail of what we may call grievances; Boston, and many other Towns have done this; To those who think as we do, they must be obvious and noticed as they arise.
We are heartily sorry for the general uneasiness that prevails thro' this Province and thro' the Continent; and wish to see the cause removed. Our earnest desire is that the tie between the Mother Country and this Province may last to the end of Time, pro- vided Government may be administered in the good old way and nothing required of us but what Justice demands us to give.
Had Jonathan Williamson participated in no other act of his beloved town, the words and sentiments presented in that notable document, sub- mitted to his fellow citizens by the committee of which he was chairman, would entitle him to lasting honor and distinction.
A few years later Captain Williamson and his neighbors were undergoing the hardships of the Revolution. It was Fate's bitter irony that during that trying period he was called upon to go into town meeting and purge himself of the charge of being inimical to the interests of the country.
Soon after peace was restored, he, ever sanguine, ever cognizant of the potentialities of his Birch Point, or Whitehaven, property for purposes other than farming, caused the same to be surveyed, streets thereon located and named, and quarter-acre lots plotted. The earliest purchaser of lots there was Capt. Joshua Hilton, who, in 1784, took a deed of lots 18 and 20, bounded on Duke Street, Queen Street and Water Street, together with the flats fronting to the low water-mark. Other Whitehaven lots of the fifty
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Early History of Wiscasset
numbered on the plan were sold by Captain Williamson, but so far as can now be learned no other use than cutting the grass was ever made of them by the purchasers. Wiscasset Point continued to increase in population and buildings, but Birch Point did not develop in the manner projected by its proprietor.
It is not known when Captain Williamson went on the Point to live. Rec- ords show that he had a mill there, probably a tide mill for grinding corn, and that on the first of January, 1798, they conveyed the Point to Benjamin Rackliff, who went there to live and who, in May, 1798, conveyed to Silas Lee. On the twenty-first of that month Lee leased a part of the Williamson house and other privileges to Captain Williamson for the nominal rental of one cent for each year he should occupy the same, indicating an equitable arrangement made for the comfort of the ancient proprietor whose occu- pancy of the property had covered the long period of sixty-two years. In tracing him to the year of his death it is found that he caused his intention of marriage with Mary Decoster, who is elsewhere described as being a spinster, to be recorded June 17, 1796; that six days later he conveyed to her such part of the Point as he then still held. He however did not long survive, for on August 16, 1798, his widow, Mary Williamson, released all her interest in the property to Silas Lee.
He was never possessed of extensive estates, but ere his long life closed he had provided each of his sons with a farm: Thomas having lot No. 16, the old Williamson Farm; Jonathan, Jr., lot No. 24; and Samuel, lot No. 4 including the land where the court house now stands. The old Williamson burial ground is a part of the inclosure known as the burying ground for the inhabitants of the southeast school district, adjoining Woodlawn Cemetery, and it is supposed that there, on the brow of a hill was deposited the body of Capt. Jonathan Williamson, but no one knows the exact spot.
Birch Point
At the time of the resettlement of Wiscasset the inhabitants were not slow to take advantage of the water power furnished by the many streams, waterfalls and tide waters in its vicinity, and mills were erected to supply the little hamlet with necessities.
The south part of the town, of which Birch Point is a section, was first occupied by an Englishman, Jonathan Williamson, and it was he who built, sometime before 1757, the first mill of which we have any written record.
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Wiscasset in Pownalborough
Later the Birch Point mills were operated by Maguire in 1833, Stinson in 1 848, George Hilton and Ira D. Sturgis in 1872.
The history of the development of Birch Point, written by William Davis Patterson and here appended, will best give the description of its mills, and the men who operated them:
With the resumption of commerce following the close of the Revolutionary War- for the commerce of Wiscasset suffered almost complete destruction during the period of hostilities-Jonathan Williamson, in the hope that his Birch Point property might be developed on village lines caused the same to be surveyed and plotted under the name of Whitehaven, a name reminiscent of his birthplace in England. But the advantages of Wiscasset Point had made such headway that, with its returning prosperity, people were attracted here and not to Birch Point.
The increase in population and taxable estates here in the East Parish of old Pownal- borough between 1784, the year when Captain Williamson sought to induce people to locate upon his Whitehaven property, and the year 1798, when that property passed into the hands of Silas Lee, is indicated by the increase of ratable polls from 195 in 1784 to 334 in 1798, in which period assessed values increased from approximately, $78,000 to $267, 130.
Silas Lee, the second of the sole proprietors of Birch Point, was the youngest son of Dr. Joseph Lee and his wife Lucy Jones. He was one of the twenty-two young men who met at the house of Joseph Tinkham on January 22, 1801 to organize the Wis- casset Fire Society, of which he was a member at the time of his death. Born at Con- cord, Massachusetts, July 3, 1760, he was nearly fifteen years of age at the time of the repulse of the British troops at the North Bridge on the day we now celebrate as Patriots' Day.
Deprivations incident to the Revolutionary War prevented his entering Harvard College until he had reached the age of twenty years, and from there he graduated in 1784. Lee, after his graduation, read law in the office of the Hon. George Thacher, of Biddeford, and in 1789, soon after being admitted to practice, he came to Wiscasset.
Timothy Langdon, who had then been practicing here for about twenty years was declining in popularity, so that Lee, beginning here, had little competition. He found this the shire town of a territorially large county, having an expanding coastwise and foreign trade. Here he soon acquired tracts of land suitable for development, such as that bounded by Fifth Street and the Common extending back to the old county road, and including what we know as the Smith Field. Here at the southwest side of the Common, he built in 1792, the house now owned by the Smith family, in which he also had his law office or "place of business." Here he resided at the time of his pur- chase of the Birch Point property, and from here he used to start upon his roundabout trips to that place; for then the land approach from this village to Birch Point was by way of the old county road, to reach which he had to pass the Meeting House, turn into the short, broad road which led to the county road into which he turned to the left, leaving on his right the wooden gaol which stood at the corner of what is now
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Early History of Wiscasset
Washington and Churchill Streets, and continuing past the "new" house of Rev. Alden Bradford, (who was then minister of the First Parish Church) and on his left the house of Dr. Thomas Rice, continuing his route lay across the Holbrook farm, the two Sevey farms, and that now occupied by Richard Grover, to the five rod road projected by the proprietors and leading to the landing at the cove into which Ward's Brook, so-called from Nehemiah Ward, an early eighteenth century settler whose meadow it drained, falls to the salt water; thence on his way toward the creek he passed the house of Ezra Porter and the old Town Pound.
It appears that Abiel Wood, Jr., was interested with Lee in the purchase of Birch Point, and that very soon after such purchase a dam, a sawmill and a large grist-mill having two pairs of stones were built at the outlet of Willimson's Cove at the southern side of the Point, at a cost of $4,000.
In 1800, the Town granted $ 150 toward building a bridge across Mill Creek to the Point. A report to the Navy Department in 1802, indicated that Birch Point had been proposed as a place for a dockyard, that upon inspection it was reported that several docks could be built there, but that one of the disadvantages was the price demanded by Mr. Lee for his land and mills, which was $12,000. Such a price would have yielded him a good profit, for it was reported that he paid $ 1,000 for the land.
Later Judge Lee had there a residence, which from all accounts, must have had many attractions. It is said that he was a man of great industry, "courteous and kind in his manner, polite and gentlemanly in his address, and familiar and easy of access. He was remarkable for his hospitality and especially desirous of entertaining men of culti- vation at his residence. He had a passion for building houses which he indulged beyond his wants or means. No one could discern more readily the sources of political power, nor the avenues that led to them. He was ambitious, but his success was always accom- plished by fair and honorable means, which were aided by a favorable concurrence of circumstances."
He represented this Town in the General Court of Massachusetts at Boston, in 1797 and 1798. In 1799, he was elected to represent the Eastern District in Congress. In 1801, although opposed in political opinions to President Jefferson, he was appointed by him as United States District Attorney for the District of Maine. In 1804, he suc- ceeded the Hon. Jonathan Bowman as Judge of Probate; in 1810, he became Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas for Lincoln County. The offices of District At- torney and Judge of Probate he held until his death in 1814. At the time of his death he was living in the large house at the end of High Street which now belongs to the heirs of Captain Richard H. Tucker, and which commands an unsurpassed view of Birch Point.
The private burial place of the Lees was located on a ridge between two pine trees back of the house which was afterward built on Lee Street by Joseph Emerson Smith, and there Judge Lee was buried. Subsequently a granite monument was erected to his memory in Evergreen Cemetery, indicating that his remains had been removed to that cemetery. The original place of interment is said to have had a marble headstone bear- ing the following inscription :
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Wiscasset in Pownalborough
Erected to the Memory of the Hon. Silas Lee, who was born July 3, 1760 and died March 1, 1814, in the 54th year of his age. He was many years Judge of Probate for the County of Lincoln, and Attorney of the United States for the District of Maine. In his public character he was diligent, faithful and just. In the relations of domestic life he was kind and affectionate, and as a Christian, sincere, humble and devout.
Judge Lee, who had no children, was survived by his wife who was Temperance Hedge of Dennis, Mass., and a niece of Judge Thacher with whom Lee had studied law.
Judge Lee's connection with Birch Point ceased August 3, 1811, when for the con- sideration of $8,500 he conveyed the Birch Point Farm and the buildings thereon, built by himself and Abiel Wood, Jr., to Major Robert Elwell. Elwell, who gained his title by serving as Brigade-Major under Brigadier General David Payson, is believed to have been of a Gloucester family of that name. He resided in Wiscasset from 1797 to 1812 in the house on Federal Street, later owned by Joshua Damon, during which time he was in active business, becoming interested in trade and navigation, and widely so in real estate. For several years he operated the Birch Point Mills, but after his removal to Boston, the ownership of both farm and mills passed by sale to John Maguire, of Charlestown, Massachusetts for the consideration of $7,000, the title being vested in the name of his wife, Mrs. Sarah Chambers Maguire, March 1, 1819. Maguire en- tered into immediate occupancy, erected additional buildings, and set up another new mill. He seems to have operated the mills and farm and in one year owned a brig called the "Eliza" which was probably used for the transportation of his product to market. There is an impression that he was by profession a lawyer, but nothing has been found to indicate that he was admitted to practice in Maine.
He is said to have been unsuccessful, due partly to his lack of experience in milling and farming, and partly to his indulgence in liquor. He was, however, one of the leaders in establishing here the Baptist Society at the time the church was erected.
When the Maguires entered into occupancy at Birch Point, they gave Major Elwell a purchase money mortgage upon the property to secure the payment of $7,000, which mortgage claim was almost immediately assigned to one Joseph Morton, who was a wealthy man then residing in Milton, Mass. In 1824, the same was by Morton turned
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174
Mrs. Davis, the wife of one of W'iscasset's earliest settlers. Original owned by the Massachusetts Historical Society.
Thomas Pownall. 1722-1805.
Early History of Wiscasset
over to Joseph E. Smith, then a Boston lawyer, who was a brother to Samuel E. Smith, afterward Governor of our State. Defaulting on this mortgage the Maguires consented to Smith's peaceable entry in foreclosure and attorned to him as tenants at will, and they finally moved away.
Directly the property came into possession of Joseph Emerson Smith, the son of Manasseh and Hannah (Emerson) Smith. He was born in Hollis, New Hampshire, March 6, 1782; graduated from Harvard College in 1 804, and was afterward admitted to the Bar and practised his profession in Boston from 1807 to the year of his death which occurred March 12, 1837. He was a bachelor and his family ties were in Wiscasset, where he acquired tracts of land, in connection with the title and occupancy of which he was very methodical. He frequently rode, tramped, and hunted over his unimproved woodlands, making careful notes relative to them. It was from a chalk or plan of a survey which he caused to be made that one was able to determine the location of one of the landmarks of the town, a spot in the famous boundary known as "Toppan's North Line."
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