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ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 03585 8031
Gc 974.202 G836h Hopkins, Henrietta M. A brief history of Greenfield, New Hampshire, 1791-1941
A Brief History of GREENFIELD NEW HAMPSHIRE
1791-1941
GEN
A BRIEF HISTORY -OF- GREENFIELD, NEW HAMPSHIRE
1791 - 1941
By
Henrietta M. Hopkins and Ruth W. Ledward
-E
BENNINGTON
Centched
HANCOCK
-
fassny !
12 !!!
FRANCESTOWN
Rivela
The WORLD
3
MOUNTAIN
CONTRACO.
OTTER LAKE
Co Bridg
FOREST Road
2
E. H. Mather
ROAD
E D. SARGENT
SULe
MT. PoAd To LYNdebo
JA.FOSS
1
First Settlers:
1. Simeon Fletcher
2. Amos Whittemore
3. Alexander Parker
To Peterborough
NORTH PACK
MONADNOCK Mt.
State Roads
-
Dirt Roads
H. ATwood
1
Mt Road
LYNDEBORO
Map of Greenfield, New Hampshire
1
eRe
8. SAYLOS
1
Sunset
1
LAKE
PETERBOROUGH
SAYLES
5
FOREWORD
Greenfield is located in the Monadnock Region, Hillsboro County, in southern New Hampshire. The area of the town is approximately twenty-seven square miles with sixty-five miles of road. Five bodies of water, Otter, Zephyr, and Sunset Lakes, Hogback and Mud Ponds, are within the borders. The elevation of the village is 830 feet above sea level. The outlying hills rise to a thousand feet and more. The summit of North Pack Monadnock Mountain, which is within the town, attains a height of 2257 feet. The community is of an agricultural rather than a manufacturing nature. A grain mill, a carpet factory, an ice business, three stores, a garage, and poultry farms, furnish the principal employ- ment. The public buildings consist of a church and town hall, a school- house, a library, and a fire station. The population is 407, a number considerably augmented by summer residents.
We wish to take this opportunity to express our appreciation to all who have aided in any way in preparing the material for this booklet and to those who have co-operated with us in our celebration activities. We also wish to thank those who have contributed financially.
GENERAL COMMITTEE.
1
EARLY YEARS
Greenfield was incorporated in 1791 from parts of Lyndeboro, Peterborough, Society Land, and a strip between Lyndeboro and Peter- borough known as Lyndeboro Slip or Gore. Society Land was a tract not granted in townships but reserved among members of a "Society" or syndicate. A rough picture of the parts of Greenfield made up of these lands may be obtained by drawing an imaginary line running through the town house or church from the north border of the town to the south border. The land east of this line may be considered as orig- inally Lyndeboro. Then another line may be drawn running from the church, west to the Contoocook River or west border of the town. The land north of this line was part of Society Land, the land south of the line, Peterborough. The "Slip" lay between the Lyndeboro and Peter- borough lines. A reminder of this land remains to us today in the name sometimes applied to the road running from the center of the town past the grain mill to the Gulf Road. The road is still occasionally called the "Slip Road"-meaning, of course, the road which led to Lyndeboro Slip.
The Indians had ceased to be a menace before the time of our first pioneers. It is evident that Greenfield was never the scene of any con- siderable Indian camps. Our lakes, meadows, and hills were probably fishing and hunting grounds. A fine Indian axe was brought to light in plowing on the Jarvis Adams' property but it seems to have been dropped by a migratory party since there is no evidence nearby of even a temporary camp. A peculiar mortar of small circumference, deeply hollowed from a field stone, was found many years ago high up on the slope of North Pack Monadnock. Archaeologists are unable to decide whether it was made by Indians or early settlers since it is not typical. At the bottom of Zephyr Lake there still rests a large dugout canoe filled with rocks. Because it has never been closely examined, little is known of its origin. Like the mortar, this dugout also may have been made by either Indians or pioneers but it is more probably of Indian origin. In summer when the light is favorable, one end of the dugout may be plainly seen through the water by anyone familiar with its location.
According to tradition, the first settlers of Greenfield were three men, Simeon Fletcher, Amos Whittemore, and Alexander Parker. The earli- est date found in connection with any settlers is 1758, the year in which Simeon Fletcher received the deed signed by John Mason (a descendant of the John Mason of the Masonian Grant) for land in what is now the eastern part of Greenfield but was then Lyndeboro. The homestead which was founded on these acres was occupied by five generations of
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Fletchers. Four generations were born there. Simeon Fletcher was the first man in town to cut hay enough to winter a cow. His first house was the usual log cabin. When the fortunes of the family improved and when the proximity of a sawmill permitted, a frame house was built. At a still later date, Philip Fletcher, Jr., a grandson of Simeon, erected a fine brick house on the same location. This brick house, built in the early eighteen hundreds, was a square structure with four chimneys affording each room a fireplace. The walls of the rooms were decorated with stenciling; the wood work included beautifully fluted moldings and cornices. This splendid old house was destroyed by fire previous to 1890. Today the spot is marked only by a cellar hole on the abandoned road which leads off from the old Mountain Road to Lyndeboro and comes out at the four corners at the place now owned by Mrs. Ella Emery. Some of the brick from the old Fletcher house was used in the foundation of the present Fred Brooks house. Simeon Fletcher gave the land for the first cemetery in town. The little burying plot is in the woods near the Lyndeboro line, some distance from any present road. Simeon Fletcher is buried there but the location of his grave, like that of many others, is lost. Three Fletchers, Simeon Sr., Simeon Jr., and Philip, served in the Continental Army during the Revolution. Simeon Jr. settled on the Martha Blanchard place. Philip remained on his father Simeon's place. The Greenfield checklist still carries the names of Fletchers, descendants of Simeon.
Amos Whittemore is credited with naming the town. His holdings were also in that part of Greenfield which was then Lyndeboro. He was established here by 1771 and it seems probable that he came several years earlier. He and Alexander Parker are traditionally known to be Simeon Fletcher's only neighbors in the earliest days. The spot where Amos Whittemore built his log cabin is on the lawn in front of the fine old brick house now owned by Edward P. Holt. When there is a sprink- ling of snow on the ground, the very slight depressions marking the out- lines of the cabin may still be seen. The brick house now standing was built by Amos Whittemore somewhat later. The material used was made within the limits of his farm where remnants of the brick yard may still be found. The house is a good example of the typical brick structure build by the more prosperous citizens of the period and is one of the few such homes left standing in our town. The exterior has been changed but little. The interior arrangement has been altered somewhat but several of the fireplaces with their beautiful mantels and rope columns remain intact. The lovely old staircase still graces the front hall. Amos Whittemore served with distinction in the Revolution and took part in the Battle of White Plains. He lies in the Whittemore ceme- tery within sight of the home which he founded.
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Residence of Edward P. Holt-Built by Amos Whittemore
From family records it appears that Alexander Parker came to the wilderness of Society Land in 1766 and struck the first blow in that part of the forest. His log cabin, which stood until 1823, was built on almost the exact spot now occupied by the home of the late Frank Russell. The well under the present house is the one dug in the front yard of the old log house. When Jeremiah Baldwin established his sawmill about 1794, a frame barn was built on the knoll somewhat to the southwest of the log house. In 1850 the subsequent owner, Nahum Russell, moved the barn across the yard and added two fifteen foot "bands" or sections to the front of it. The building stands today as the barn attached to the present house by a shed. Alexander Parker was for many years the lead- ing spirit in his locality. He urged new settlers to establish homes and was constantly planning for the welfare of the community. For those times he was a man of wealth. We are told he was for many years the larg . est taxpayer in Society Land. At the opening of the Revolution in 1775, he answered the call of his country and enlisted in Captain John Parker's Company, a part of Colonel Timothy Bedel's Regiment of Rangers. He was always afterward known as Captain Parker. In his old age he went to Antrim to live with this son, David, where he died in 1815.
After these three original settlers, Simeon Fletcher, Amos Whitte- more, and Alexander Parker, others soon followed, settling first on the scattered hill tops or less frequently near the meadows. These distant neighbors often signalled to one another by means of blazing torches held aloft. By 1775 many homes had been established in that portion of the town which was then Lyndeboro. The parts which were sections
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of Peterborough and Society Land were more sparsely settled. The bat- tle of Lexington on April 19, 1775, electrified the country. At this time Greenfield was not a town; it is therefore impossible to give a correct iist of the men who went to the war from here. It can only be said that practically every able bodied man from sixteen to sixty and over armed himself with whatever weapons he possessed and marched off to fight for liberty. The location of many homes where these brave men lived within our present township have been located. Various legends survive concerning some of these patriots who left their hard won homes to de- fend their country. One tells of Amos Whittemore, whose wife, Molly, decided on the eve of his departure that his attire was not suitable for such a noble purpose. She therefore sheared a black sheep, prepared the wool, spun the yarn, wove the cloth, and cut and made a pair of pantaloons; all this, supposedly, within twenty-four hours!
John Reynolds was building his barn (still standing and now owned by Charles Hodges) when word reached him of the battle of Lexington. He thereupon drove his axe into a beam where the mark may still be seen and immediately departed to take his place with the defenders.
The scattered inhabitants of Society Land assembled at the home of Deacon Aiken in Antrim and elected Isaac Butterfield of Greenfield their captain and marched toward Boston. They went to Tyngsboro where they met General Stark who told them there were enough men near Boston and advised them to return and plant their corn but to hold themselves ready to march at a moment's notice. He also told them that however rusty their guns, he knew of no men to whom he would sooner trust his life in the hour of battle. The company returned. Isaac Butter- field later joined the North Continental Army and eventually became a major. He lived on a road, now abandoned, not far from where the present state road crosses the Greenfield-Bennington town line. A de- pression marks the site of the home he built. His door stone with his initials and date, I. B. 1779, crudely carved, may be seen nearby. This stone, with the inscription outward, at a later date was put into the wall bordering the road and was familiar to the many who passed that way. More recently the stone has fallen backward out of the wall, face up, and would now be passed unnoticed unless the dead leaves were brushed away from the inscription.
After the Revolution was over in 1781, men could once more return to the task of hewing homes from the forest. New settlers now came into this area in larger numbers. Some moved in from nearby towns; many came greater distances from Londonderry, New Hampshire, and from An- dover, Salem, and Chelmsford, Massachusetts. Scattering tracts were cleared and settled in the parts of the town familiar to us at the present time but some of the neighborhoods first settled are now little known
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and growing up to woodland. During these years Simeon Fletcher had several neighbors. One was John Savage, also a Revolutionary soldier, who kept the first tavern in town. The spot is marked by a cellar hole near the town line on the road leading into Greenfield over the mountain from Lyndeboro, past the Dwight Sayles place. This Sayles place was built and occupied by a son of John Savage, William, known as “Moun- tain Bill." John Savage and his wife, Mary, are buried in the little ceme- tery given to the town by Simeon Fletcher. The slate stones marking their graves and that of John Fletcher, son of Simeon, are the only three now remaining visible. Hezekiah Dunckley, also a Revolutionary soldier and a man prominent in town affairs, was another neighbor of Simeon Fletcher. His home was high on the slope of Rose Mountain, close to the Lyndeboro line, above the present home of Robert Thomas. John Grant lived at the Thomas place at this time.
Russell Hill, where Alexander Parker made his home, became well settled as the years passed. Robert Rogers' home was on that part of the slope known as Sunset Hill. Robert Alexander's house was on the site of the present Coville house. Well known to fishermen of today is the Alexander brook which flows down over the hill through what was the Robert Alexander farm. Toward the Francestown side of the hill were other early houses of whose occupants we have no definite knowledge.
The hill now known as the "Top of the World" was undoubtedly settled at this time. In this vicinity William Glover, Jonathan Gillis, Douglas Robinson, and Samuel Hixon made their homes, now overtaken by woods and pastures and for many years forgotten.
The Ramseys had been established since 1774: James, at the place now owned by Dr. Sawyer; his uncle, John Ramsey, on the adjoining farm. Ebenezer Farrington made his home at the present Larry W. Flynn place in 1779. Charles Cavender's home was not far away. The names of all four of these men appear on the Revolutionary Rolls.
An old road, now discernible only by the two bordering stone walls marching sturdily up hill and down, across brooks and through thick underbrush, came in from Francestown near the present home of Mrs. Alice Davis. It led across the pastures to Sunset Lake and beyond there joined the road to Bennington. There were half a dozen houses along the old road. The house of James Bayle (Bailey) was near the Green- field-Francestown line. Ebenezer Coster seems to have made his home about half a mile distant. It is certain that considerably later, Aaron Hardy lived near the lake.
One of the first roads in the section led over the shoulder of North Pack Monadnock, past the present Atwood house, through Lyndeboro Slip, to Peterborough. A large tract of land bordering this road was
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purchased by Deacon Joshua Holt of Andover, Massachusetts, previous to 1780. The price paid was a pair of oxen. Deacon Holt had six sons and five daughters. Four of the sons, Joshua Jr., John, Timothy, and Stephen, cleared land for farms on the tract. Joshua Jr. established his home in the northern portion at the present Zillessen place. He served in the Revolution previous to coming to Greenfield. John's farm was on the aforementioned Mountain Road, as was Timothy's, but Timothy's holdings were just across the line in Peterborough. Stephen, who lived nearly a century, settled on the farm now owned by George W. Putnam. All of these four brothers were deacons in the Greenfield church, held various town offices, and were prominent in the community. They spent their lives and died on the farms they wrested from the wilderness. Four of Joshua's daughters married Greenfield men. Phoebe married Joseph Batchelder who lived on the place which is now the summer home of Alden Foss. Chloe married Francis Bowers and lived nearby but across the Peterborough line near Happy Valley. Mary was the wife of Isaac Foster and lived near Brantwood Camp. Abiah married Daniel Kimball, who at an early date located presumably in the same vicinity. He too had served in the Revolution. While he was clearing his land, he slept in a large hollow log and stopped the entrance with a stump to exclude the inquisitive forest animals. He was accustomed at this time to walk three miles to Peterborough to get his bread baked. Soon after his mar- riage to Abiah Holt, he removed to Hancock. Hannah, another daugh- ter, married a distant cousin, Ephraim Holt. They arrived at a slightly later date after the town was incorporated, and lived on the next place east of John's, near the present road leading to the so-called Adams' Chalet. The father, Deacon Joshua Holt, retained his interest in the affairs of the town and church although he never made his home here. He used to say that he could come here and assemble his nine children in two hours-a remarkable feat for 1790 when the fastest means of com- munication and travel was by horseback. He could visit them all with- out passing any house or land other than that owned by his sons or sons- in-law. Direct descendants of Jashua Holt, through Stephen, are promi- nent in town affairs to this day.
In 1789 Peter Peavey of Wilton bought wild land in Lyndeboro Slip at the foot of North Pack Monadnock. Within a year his brother, Thomas, followed him here and took up a tract to the south bordering Peter's. They both had Revolutionary War records. A road, long abandoned, led up the steep hill from the Gulf Road, past the Peavey cabins and on up to the Mountain Road. The log cabin Peter Peavey built may be considered typical of those of the hardy pioneers whu chose to clear land from the unconquered forest. This particular cabin was about eighteen feet square. A stone fireplace and chimney reached
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to above the level of the loft floor; from here it was topped off with sticks and clay. There was no glass for the three small windows; instead oiled paper was used in one while the other two were stopped by boards which were removed only when light was needed or the clemency of the weather allowed. The doorway was wide enough to permit the dragging in of a hand sled loaded with logs for the huge fireplace. The log walls were chinked with moss. In the cabin the blazing logs furnished light as well as heat and were probably supplemented at night by a knot of brightly burning pitch pine propped in front of the fireplace. This pitch pine grew abundantly on the plains between Sunset and Otter Lakes and was the object of yearly journeys of the early settlers from here and also from surrounding towns.
Peter Peavey moved his household goods from his previous home in Wilton by ox team; his wife followed on horseback with the baby, Peter Jr., in her lap. The horse was also laden with a pair of saddle bags, a large bundle behind the saddle and a tin lantern hanging from the pom- mel. Because the horse travelled faster than the oxen, stout-hearted Lucy Peavey soon overtook her husband and went on ahead. At the last house she passed, she lighted the candle in the lantern, not because it was dark but because there would be no other means of lighting the fire. She now had to leave the travelled path and continue alone through the forest, guided only by blazed trees. She reached the new cabin in time to kindle the first fire before her husband's arrival.
Joseph Severence's home was to the west of the Peavey places. No trace of a road leads to it today and indeed the exact location cannot be pointed out. There were other early comers in the vicinity of the present Foss place. William Blunt lived somewhere nearby on the old Gulf Road which then ran somewhat north of its present course. Also on the old road was John Dane's home. He had at least one near neigh- bor whose name is unknown.
The customary manner of clearing land from the virgin forest was to fell the trees and burn them. The logs not entirely consumed by this first burning were rolled together and again set afire. It was of primary importance that some sort of food be grown as soon as possible. Rye, hoed in among the stumps and rocks, was usually the first crop and yielded well on the new ground. Potatoes and turnips were planted in much the same fashion and also provided the needed food for the winter. Corn was grown after the land had been cultivated a few years. Beans and pumpkins were staples in the diet. Flax was important and grew well on new land. It was the women's work not only to spin and weave the flax for clothing and household use but also to harvest and prepare it.
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NORTH FACK FROM OREENFIELD, N. H.
North Pack Monadnock from Greenfield
The ox was the most useful animal of the farm. Only one cow was usually kept at first because there was but little pasturage owing to the necessity of using the cleared land for food crops. Swine were allowed to forage in the woods for their own sustenance.
For a few years wolves were a menace to the domestic animals. Fox- es and bobcats abounded and are still common to us today. Deer have always been numerous, but moose, though plentiful in the early days, have practically disappeared.
Philip Fletcher once encountered a bear face to face when he was on his way to visit his brother, Simeon. These beasts, until they were exterminated many years later, were a source of annoyance to the settlers. The last bear was killed in 1860 on the shoulder of Crotched Mountain in a pasture belonging to the late Frank Russell.
Turkeys and other game birds were plentiful and were used to some extent for food. The passenger pigeons, within recent years extinct, came in vast flocks and were slaughtered by the hundreds for food. Within the memory of men now living there was, in back of the Jarvis Adams home, a so-called pigeon stand where the birds were caught in quantities in a net.
In spite of all the hardships encountered, the land was eagerly taken up by the men who, through their perseverance and industry, became the founders of the town.
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The first petition to the General Court of New Hampshire to set apart the town of Greenfield was in May 1784. It was signed by forty- eight men including most of those already mentioned. Another petition, to which new names were added, followed in December of the same year. The petitioners were persuaded not to change their status for three years. Apparently nothing was done for six years. In April 1790, the following petition was addressed to the General Court.
"Petition for the Setting Off Of the Northwest Part of the Town (Lyndeboro) 1790"
"To the Honorable General Court of the State of N. H .:
The Petition of the inhabitants of the Society Land, So Called, humbly shews that your Petitioners, Living in Said Society, Labour under many disadvantages and inconveniences by not Being in a Cor- porated Town, And cannot Enjoy Such Privileges as to Render their Circumstance Agreeable. Wherefore, your Petitioners Humbly Pray that that Northwest Part of the town of Lyndeboro, of which the inhabitants hath for some years past been desirous of being better accommodated, May be Annexed to that part of the Society Land Lying South and Southerly of the Crotched Mountain with Lyndeboro Slip, and in- corporated into a town therewith, and your Petitioners, as in Duty Bound, Will Ever Pray: Benjamin Pollard, Stephen Gould, Alexander Parker, Robert Rodgers, Samuel Farmer, William Glover, Douglass Robinson, William McCrae, Ebenezer Farrington, Thomas Addison, John Waugh, Pyam Herrick, Samuel Cudworth, Samuel Weeks, Oliver Holt, William Wilson, Robert Alexander, Thomas Atkison, John Chase, Timothy Cudworth, Jonathan Gillis, James Ramsey, Robert Waugh, John McMaster, Charles Cavender, John Ramsey. Societyland, April ye 27, 1790."
On May 25, 1790 another petition was submitted to the General Court and read as follows: The Petition of the Subscribers, Inhab- itants of a gore of land lying between Lyndeborough and Peterborough, known by the name of Lyndeboro Gore, Humbly Shews: That your Petitioners have been encouraged to settle in this Mountain- ous part of this State, in expectation of being incorporated with some Adjacent Inhabitants into a body Politic with the same privileges that other towns enjoy,-that your petitioners and famileys Consist of Forty-one souls, and live Seven miles, or upward, from Lyndeboro Meeting house, and in addition to the badness of Travel generally attending new Settlements, we have to cross the Petit Manadnack Mountain to attend Public Worship,-that we have not power to raise any money for laying out and repairing highways or Schooling our children,-that public Instruction in the great duties of
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life and education of our Children we Esteem as a duty and Privilege, and think it of great importance, either in a Religious or political view, which we are, by our local Situation, deprived of, and must so remain or quit our habitation unless relieved by the Honorable General Court,- that That part of Lyndeborough that is adjacent to us lies west of the Petit Monadinock Mountains and that part of the Society land that lays South of the Crotched Mountain, and is bounded on the west by the Contoocook River can never be Accommodated in any other way than by being incorporated together with us and one Range of Lots in the Town of Peterborough, and that with them we think ourselves Able to make every Necessary provision for the enjoyment of Privileges and Advantages that other towns enjoy.
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