USA > New Hampshire > Colony, province, state, 1623-1888: history of New Hampshire > Part 14
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In a general sense the settlers of the township displaced the Indians, but no particular tribe is known to have occupied the territory save as a hunting-ground and fishing rendezvous. The name of one Indian only has come down to us as having any connection with the place, and his record is very traditional and vague. Plausawa, in whose honor the hill in North Pembroke is named, is said to have had his wigwam in that locality. his comrades, Sabatis and Christi, he was a frequent visitor to
With this and neighboring sections, until war was declared, when he cast his lot with the St. Francis tribe. The three are charged with having led or instigated the attack upon Suncook and Ep- som in after years. During a cessation of hostilities, Plausawa and Sabatis were killed while on a friendly visit to Boscawen, in 1753.
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HISTORY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
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Lovewell's township, or Suncook, was a frontier town for many years after its settlement. That it suffered no more dur- ing the contest was owing to the fact that its young men were constantly on the scout toward the enemy.
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SECOND DIVISION, ROMAN, DRAWN
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IN Mcclintock. Dez
The settlers were the Puritans, from the old Bay Colony ; the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, from the settlement of London-
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LOVEWELL'S TOWN SHIP FIRST DIVISION, ARABIC, BRAMY 1730
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derry ; and, lastly, the New Hampshire settlers from the neigh- borhood of Exeter, Dover and Kingston, who came in later under Bow titles. Truly the town was not homogeneous. A French family was the first to locate in town, and several Welsh families settled there later.
The inroad of settlers in 1730 was probably rapid. The giants of the forest fell before the woodman's axe, and the log cabin was rendered homelike by the presence of women and children. The few scattering Indians remaining in the neigh- borhood were indifferent or friendly, and doubtless the settlers received occasional calls from them.
The log houses built by the pioneers of the last century have been replaced by framed buildings, but they may still be seen in the logging camps of Grafton and Coos counties, and in all new countries. In summer the life was not unpleasant ; the river teemed with shad, salmon, and trout ; the deer and the bear wandered in the neighboring forests ; the virgin soil yielded wonderful harvests. Their fare was simple, but with prudence and foresight one could provide for the family during the long winter months, with ordinary exertion. Fuel was at their very doors, to be had for the chopping, and pitch pine knots answered for candles and gas.
Wolves, lean and hungry, might howl about their safely barred windows, but could not enter their dwellings ; nor could the cold affect them, with logs hospitably piled in the open fire- place. The Bible and New England Primer might form their thoroughly read library, but tradition was a never failing source of interest to them
James Moore probably erected his house this year, said to have been the first framed building in the township, and the frame to-day forms a part of Samuel Emery Moore's house. Neighbors from Buckstreet and Concord assisted at the raising, and a few Indians are said to have helped. Tradition asserts that one of the latter was worsted in a friendly contest and trial of strength, usual from time immemorial on such occasions, and became very angry at his overthrow, threatening vengeance. His wrath was appeased by a potation from a brown jug which
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NOTE. Very early in the Suncook records is a mention of a conflict between the Orthodox and Presbyterian churches. By the former Rev. Aaron Wh'ttemore was settled as the minister of the parish, the latter entering a formal protest. At the time of his settlement the Presbyterians were in a majority in the township; but absent grantees, residents in Massachusetts, claimed the right of voting by proxy, and maintained control of the political and religious affairs of the town.
Rev. Aaron Whittemore was a graduate of Harvard College, and for a third of a century sus- tained a leading position in the affairs of Suncook and Pembroke. During the French and Indian war his house was garrisoned by an armed force, and he had a commission in the militia. Many prominent families in the State trace back their ancestry to him, and his descendants are very numerons and influential. Among them are the Kittredges and Woodmans, besides the Whittemores scattered throughout the State from Nashua to the Upper Coos.
Submitting to the inevitable the Presbyterian members of the parish became reconciled; and for many years listened to the preaching, and paid their rates towards the support, of Mr. Whittemore.
The Province line, as determined, must have been to the latter a grievance, for he was a faithful son of the Bay Colony and in favor of its laws and institutions.
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had already come into use. Moore was very sagacious in his treatment of the Indians, and gained their friendship ; his place was avoided by them in after years during the hostilities, although it was fortified to repel an attack.
Besides granting the township of Bow, the New Hampshire authorities, in 1727, granted Epsom, Barnstead, Chichester, Can- terbury and Gilmanton to companies intending to form perma- nent settlements, thus extending the frontier out into the interior. Epsom and Canterbury were immediately occupied and garri- soned later during the French and Indian wars, while the other townships were not reclaimed from the wilderness until the re- turn of peace.
Newmarket was cut off from Exeter in 1727. Rev. John Moody was ordained and settled in 1730; Rev. S. Tombs, in 1794; Rev. James Thurston, in 1800.
Governor William Burnet assumed the office of chief magis- trate of Massachusetts and New Hampshire in July 1728, com- ing from New York, where he had acted in the same capacity. He was welcomed at Boston by a committee of the council and assembly of the Province of New Hampshire, and was after- wards granted a regular salary. He died in September, 1729, having visited New England but once, and was succeeded by Governor Jonathan Belcher.
Governor Burnet had been very popular in New York, and was described by Lieutenant-Governor Wentworth, in one of his speeches, as " a gentleman of known worth, having justly ob- tained a universal regard from all who have had the honor to be under his government." He died at the early age of forty- one years.
Belcher, a native of New England, was a merchant of large fortune and unblemished reputation. He had spent six years in Europe and had been presented at court. "He was graceful in his person, elegant and polite in his manners ; of a lofty and aspiring disposition ; a steady, generous friend ; a vindictive, but not implacable enemy." 1
A controversy soon arose between the new governor and I Belknap.
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· Wentworth, the lieutenant-governor of the Province, on account of a letter which Wentworth had written to Governor Shute, and all friendly relations between the two ceased. Belcher took active measures to express his enmity, curtailing the importance and emoluments of the office of lieutenant-governor, to the dis- gust and disappointment of Wentworth and his many friends. Wentworth himself did not long survive, but died Dec. 12, 1730, at the age of fifty-nine years.
Lieutenant-Governor John Wentworth was the son of Samuel and Mary (Benning) Wentworth of New Castle, and the grand- son of Elder William Wentworth of Exeter, who signed the "combination " in 1639. He was born in June 16, 1672, and in early life was a sea-captain. After leaving the sea he was a mer- chant, and was reputed a fair and generous dealer. " He was a gentleman of good natural abilities, much improved by conver- sation ; remarkably civil and kind to strangers ; respectful to the ministers of the gospel ; a lover of good men of all denomi- nations ; compassionate and bountiful to the poor ; courteous and affable to all." 1 In February, 1711-12, he was appointed a councillor by Queen Anne, in place of Winthrop Hilton, de- ceased, and was justice of the Court of Common Pleas from 1713 to 1718. He was appointed lieutenant-governor in 1717, and held the office until his death. Of his sixteen children, fourteen survived him, of whom one was Benning Wentworth and another the wife of Theodore Atkinson.
The course pursued by Governor Belcher was resented by the friends of Wentworth and the opposition was led by Benning Wentworth and Theodore Atkinson ; but Belcher disregarded his opponents and apprehended no danger from their resent- ment.
Mr. Wentworth was succeeded as lieutenant-governor by David Dunbar, a native of Ireland, formerly a colonel in the British service, and unfriendly to Governor Belcher. He had been commander of the fort at Pemaquid, and upon his appear- ance in New Hampshire, in 1731, he joined the party in opposi- tion to the governor. Soon after his arrival a petition was sent
I Belknap.
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1731]
to England, praying for the removal of Governor Belcher, "alleg- ing that his government was grievous, oppressive, and arbitrary." Richard Waldron, with a party friendly to the governor, drew up an address in Belcher's favor, and forwarded it at the same time. As a result of letters and petitions, Theodore Atkinson, Benning Wentworth, and Joshua Peirce were appointed councillors, but being kept out of office for two years, the two former were elected to the Assembly, where they maintained their opposition.
Dr. Belknap is of the opinion that it was the design of Gov- ernor Belcher to effect a union of New Hampshire with Massa- chusetts; but the people could not be brought to ask for it. The opposition favored a government entirely distinct from Massachusetts. The chief trouble which they encountered was the poverty and limited area of the Province, and so they ad- vocated its enlargement. They were in favor of determining the boundary lines of the Province, which the governor and his friends were by no means anxious to settle. The New Hamp- shire authorities became more zealous to have the line deter- mined than Massachusetts, although they realized that it would not greatly benefit them personally, as the territory would either revert to the King, to again grant, or become the property of the heirs of Mason and Allen.
The governor, as obliged by his instructions, frequently urged the settlement of the lines in his speeches; and a committee from both provinces met at Newbury, in the autumn of 1731, to arrange the affair; but the Massachusetts party prevented an accommodation ; whereupon the New Hampshire authorities de- termined no longer to treat with Massachusetts, but to petition the King to decide the controversy.
Accordingly, in 1732, John Rindge, a merchant of Portsmouth, who had influential friends in England, was appointed by the Assembly agent for the Province. He visited the old country, and presented to the King a petition, requesting the establish- ment of the line between the two provinces ; and upon his re- turn to America the affair was left to the management of Cap- tain John Thomlinson, a merchant of London, a gentleman of great penetration, industry and address. This petition, how-
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ever, was not endorsed by the governor or by his council; but was authorized by the Assembly and the lieutenant-governor.
Governor Belcher charged Dunbar with being " false, perfidi- ous, malicious, and revengeful, a plague to the governor and a de- ceiver of the people." The opposition alleged that the governor consented at every session of the Massachusetts Assembly to grants of land within the disputed territory.
In 1732, a vote of the proprietors of Suncook is the first mention in the town records of the Bow controversy. In case the claim of Massachusetts was sustained, the right of the gran- tees of Suncook would be established ; in case New Hampshire obtained jurisdiction, the right to the land would be legally vested in the heirs of John Mason.
Oyster River, a parish of Dover, was incorporated as Durham in 1732. It had been made a parish in 1651 ; separated in 1675 ; incorporated in 1716. It had suffered severely during the Indian wars, the enemy frequently committing depredations within its limits. A church was built in 1655. The first minister, settled in the parish in 1674, was John Russ, who died in 1736, at the age of one hundred and eight years. He was also the parish physician. Rev. Hugh Adams was settled in 1718; Rev. Nicholas Gilman, in 1741 ; Rev. John Adams, in 1748 ; Rev. Curtis Coe, in 1780, who was dismissed in 1806.
The township of Narragansett No. 3, Souhegan West, or Am- herst, was granted, in 1733, by Massachusetts. The first settle- ment was commenced, in 1734, by Samuel Walton and Samuel Lampson and others from Essex county. A meeting house was built in 1739. The town was incorporated in 1760, as Amherst, and upon the organization of Hillsborough County it was made the shire town. Milford, in 1794, and Mount Vernon, in 1803, were separated from Amherst. A church was organized in 1741, and Daniel Wilkins was settled as minister, and continued there until his death, in February, 1784. Rev. Jeremiah Bar- nard was settled in 1779; Rev. Nathan Lord, in 1816, after- wards president of Dartmouth College.
The township of Contoocook, afterwards Boscawen, was granted by Massachusetts in 1733, and a settlement was made
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the next year by Nathaniel Danforth, Andrew Bohonnon, Moses Burbank, Stephen Gerrish and Edward Emery, a colony from Newbury, Massachusetts. Soon twenty or thirty families were settled within the township. A fort, one hundred feet square and ten feet high, was built in 1739, in which the inhabitants were obliged to take refuge for a period of twenty-two years. Rev. Phinehas Stevens was settled as minister in 1737, and a meeting house was built the next year, as large as that at Rum- ford and "two feet higher." Mr. Stevens was succeeded, in 1761, by Rev. Robie Morrill ; in 1768, by Rev. Nathaniel Merrill ; in 1781, by Rev. Samuel Wood, who continued in the ministry for over fifty years. The town was incorporated in 1760, and named in honor of Admiral Boscawen.
Settlements were pushed up the valley of the Connecticut as far as Charlestown soon after 1735, in which year that town, by the name of No. 4, was granted by Massachusetts to the citizens of Northampton, Hadley, Hatfield, Deerfield and Sunderland. The first settlers were several families by the name of Parker, Farnsworth, Sartwill from Groton, Hastings from Lunenburg, and Stevens from Rutland. In 1743 a fort was built, under the direction of Colonel Stoddard of Northampton; and the first mills were erected the following year. The town was temporarily abandoned by the inhabitants in 1747, on account of the Indian war, but a garrison was stationed at the fort as a protection to the frontiers. Charlestown was incorporated in July, 1753. Rev. John Dennis was settled as minister in 1754 ; Rev. Bulkley Olcott, in 1761 ; Rev. Jaazaniah Crosby, in 1810; Rev. J. De F. Richards, in 1841 ; Rev. Worthington Wright, in 1851.
In the meanwhile, the relations between Governor Belcher and his lieutenant-governor, Dunbar, were not of an amicable character. Dunbar had no seat in the council, and was de- prived of command of the fort at New Castle, and as many of his perquisites as possible, by the governor. In anger, Dunbar retired to his fort at Pemaquid, where he remained two years, Upon his return, he was treated with less severity by the governor.
Dunbar, in his office of surveyor-general of the King's woods,
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was frequently arbitrary in his dealings with the people upon the Piscataqua, and incurred their enmity. At Exeter, while enforcing some of his obnoxious regulations, he was set upon by a force disguised as Indians, and, together with his party, re- ceived rough usage. They were obliged to tramp back to Portsmouth, as their boat was rendered unserviceable. For this offence he could receive no legal redress, as his assailants were unknown. As a retaliation, he ordered that courts should be holden only at Portsmouth, instead of at Exeter, Dover, and Hampton, as formerly. He was caressed by the opponents of Belcher, and, in 1737, went to England to prosecute his design of creating New Hampshire into an independent province, of which he desired to obtain control. Disappointed in his ambi- tion, he accepted an office offered by the East India Company, and was appointed governor of St. Helena.
The trade of the Province at this time consisted chiefly in the exportation of lumber and fish to Spain and Portugal, and the Caribbee Islands. The mast trade was wholly confined to Great Britain. In the winter, small vessels went to the south- ern colonies with English and West India goods, and returned with corn and pork. Woollen manufacture was diminished, as sheep were scarce, but the manufacture of linen had greatly in- creased by the emigration from the north of Ireland.1
In 1732, an Episcopal church was organized at Portsmouth, and a chapel built, which was consecrated in 1734; and two years later, Rev. Arthur Brown was settled as their minister, with a salary from the " Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts." In 1735, the Province was visited with a new epidemic, known as the throat distemper; and of the first forty who had it none recovered. It first appeared at Kingston. In the whole Province not less than one thousand persons died of the disease, of whom some nine hundred were children. Over two hundred died at Hampton Falls, and over one hundred at Exeter, Kingston, and Durham.
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In 1737, the settlers at Suncook bargained with John Coch- ran of Londonderry to erect a saw-mill and a grist-mill on the
I Belknap.
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Suncook river, and agreed to deed to him lot No. 1, which embraced the compact part of the present village of Suncook, in the town of Pembroke. The conditions of the grant he evi- dently complied with, for the deeds of all property within that area can be traced to him.
In accordance with a vote the first road to Rumford was laid out. It led diagonally across the lots, very directly from the first meeting house, built in 1733, at the north-east corner of the cemetery, over intervening land to the bridge over the Sou- cook, thence by the river bank to the great bend in the Merri- mack, where a ferry was early established, about a mile below the lower bridge in Concord, and nearly as far above the rail- road bridge.
A bounty of sixpence a tail was voted for every rattlesnake killed in the township.
The north and east part of the town was then a wilderness, covered by the primeval forest. The Suncook settlers, for the most part, were on the home lots, which were on each side of what is now Pembroke street. Their meadow lots, on the Sun- cook, Merrimack and Soucook rivers, were reached by winding paths through the forest, and were valuable to the pioneers from the wild grass that grew upon them. The intervale lots along the Merrimack are said to have been open at the first settlement, from inundations of the river, or kept so by the Indians, the former occupants of the land, as corn fields.
An old man once said that the pioneers settled on high land, not on account of its fertility, but to avoid the trails of the savages, which were made by the river bank ; that the Indians would never turn from their march to do malicious injury, except when on the war path ; and because from an elevation the clearings could be better protected by a stockade and garrison house.
Thomlinson, the agent of New Hampshire in England, was indefatigable in his efforts in behalf of the little Province. It was greatly due to him that the chapel was built at Portsmouth, and that a minister was settled over the parish. Through his instrumentality, commissioners from among the councillors of
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HISTORY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
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New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Nova Scotia, all from royal governments except those from Rhode Island, and with that colony Massachusetts had a controversy respecting boundaries, were appointed to adjudicate the dispute on boun- dary line. The commissioners, three from Nova Scotia, and five from Rhode Island, met at Hampton, August 1, 1737. Here they were met by a committee of the New Hampshire Assembly, who presented the demands of the Province, while agents of Massachusetts stated their claims. On the 10th of August, the General Court of Massachusetts met at Salisbury, while the General Court of New Hampshire met at Hampton Falls. The latter, however, were not united, as the Council were of the Massachusetts party, while the Assembly favored the New Hampshire pretensions. The commissioners, how- ever, could not determine definitely the line between the two Provinces, but referred the matter to the King and Council. Here the New Hampshire interests were again entrusted to Thomlinson, who was a host in himself. Not receiving the nec- essary papers from the New Hampshire authorities to prosecute their claim, he manufactured such as he thought would be most powerful for the benefit of his clients of New Hampshire. While the matter was pending, in 1738, Thomlinson bought up the Masonian claim to the Province for £1,000, on his own responsibility, in behalf of the New Hampshire Assembly.
In this appeal, New Hampshire had the advantage of the most skilful advocates, who represented the "poor, little, loyal, distressed Province of New Hampshire " as crowded and op- pressed by the "vast, opulent, overgrown Province of Massa- chusetts ;" and New Hampshire won the case. The question was settled by his Majesty, in council, March 5, 1740, and the present southern and eastern boundary of New Hampshire was established. Many townships granted by Massachusetts were found to be without the jurisdiction of the Province that had granted their charters, and within a Province governed by differ- ent laws, and where the title to the wild land was in dispute.
This was the more bitter to the inhabitants of the territory because of the Masonian claim. This hung over their heads,
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and affected their ownership in the lands which they had recovered from a wilderness by years of toil and exposure. The Province of New Hampshire gained jurisdiction over a strip of land fourteen miles wide, extending its whole width, and was supposed to include the present State of Vermont. Twenty- eight newly granted townships, between the Merrimack and Connecticut rivers, were cut off from Massachusetts and annexed to New Hampshire. The latter Province gained seven hundred square miles more than the authorities had claimed, besides the territory west of the Connecticut river.'
Kensington was detached from Hampton, and incorporated in 1737, when Rev. Jeremiah Fogg was settled as minister over the town. He was succeeded, in 1793, by Rev. Napthali Shaw ; in 1812, by Rev. Nathaniel Kennedy.
1 Civil Engineer Nelson Spofford, of Haverhill, boundary line surveyor on the part of Massachusetts in the present controversy with New Hampshire, is in receipt of valuable and important copies of maps and other documents relative to this subject from the Public Records office of England.
In ISS3 Mr. Spofford made inquiries of Minister Lowell as to the necessary proceedings in order to ascertain what documents might be found on record relative to the settlement of the boundary line controversy in 1741.
Mr. Stevens was employed to search the records, and he forwarded to Mr. Spofford a list of twenty-five documents and maps relating to this subject, with the cost of copying; and here the matter rested until the Boundary Line Commission was organized, in 1885, when Mr. Spofford was directed to order copies of such documents as might appear to be of the most import- ance, but owing to delays from various causes these documents have been but recently received.
The list embraces some three hundred pages foolscap of closely written matter, and copies of three maps. Among the documents appear the following :
No. I. Public Record Office of England. Colonial Correspondence Bd. of Trade New England. Oreder of the King in Council. 9 April 1740. Indorsed, New England, Massachusetts Bay New Hampshire Order of Council dated April 9th 1740 directing the Board to prepare an Instruction to the Governor of the Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire for settling the Bounds of these Provinces pursuant to a report of the Committee of Council.
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