USA > New Hampshire > Rockingham County > Portsmouth > Early Portsmouth history > Part 6
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In 1630 the bark "Warwick" and another vessel, the "Pied Cow," arrived in the Piscataqua. 12 On board the "Warwick" were Capt. Walter Neal, 5, 12 or Neale,7 and Ambrose Gibbons.5,8 Possibly one Warrenton arrived at the same time. Warrenton, according to instructions, took charge of the Great House at Strawberry Bank, built in 1631.5 Neale had been appointed attorney for the New England Council to put Capt. John Mason in formal posses- sion of his newly named territory of New Hampshire, which he had acquired under his grant of November 7, 1629.12 Neale had also been appointed Governor 7 and agent in behalf of the Laconia Company, that is, those adventurers who were striving to profit out of the Laconia grant on the borders of Lake Champlain, and who had made Pannaway, Newichwannock and the Piscataqua River the entering wedge to the same.
Captain Neale, the most important person of the Piscataqua settlements at the moment, took up resi- dence at the house at Pannaway.8 His duty of placing Capt. John Mason in formal possession of his terri- tory seems to have been of minor importance; also he had to govern few in number.8 Neale was pri- marily the agent of the Laconia Company.3 He, apparently, had promised to try to discover the more or less mythical lakes referred to in the Laconia grant, to secure the beaver skins which his employers desired, and to discover the mines they hoped for.3 Neale made an effort to keep his promise, and he is said to
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
have started out on foot with Darby Field to find the beautiful inland lakes.3 They went as far as the White Mountains, which, from crystal stones reported found on them, became known as the "Chrystal Hills."3 Of these hills, a report, questioned as to its accuracy, says they said that they were "a ridge extending an hundred leagues, on which snow lieth all the year."3 Neale stayed as agent of the Laconia Company for three years, leaving the colony July 15, 1633,12 and returning to England with the report, "Non est inventa provincia."1 Ambrose Gibbons, who, report states, came with Neale in the "Warwick," took charge, as instructed, of the upper plantation at Newichwannock.5 He planned to set up a saw- mill there.8 He resided in a palisaded house at this upper settlement, and traded with the Indians.3 There was but little regard at this time for agriculture on the Piscataqua River. What the financial backers in England and what their representatives on the Pis- cataqua seem almost wholly to have had in mind was trade with the Indians, exploration in the hope of discovering mines, fishing, and, to a small extent, the raising of grapes.
Capt. John Mason gave hearty backing to his interests in the New World. Though his individual interests were merged and confused with those of Sir Ferdinando Gorges and the Laconia Adventurers in many ways, Mason had his own individual ambi- tions in connection with the Piscataqua settlement. This settlement, apparently, did not include the settlement at Hilton's Point. Mr. Edward Hilton, largely, if not wholly, emancipated himself, through his grant of 1629, from Mason's control; and the Hilton settlement seems to have been managed in-
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
dependently of Gorges and Mason. This seems to have occurred naturally and without friction between Gorges and Mason on the one part, and the Dover colony on the other. Mason and his associates sent over to the Piscataqua, or adopted from other col- onies, fifty men, twenty-two women and eight Danes.7
One of the men who arrived in 1631 was Humphrey Chadbourne, a carpenter, who later settled at what became South Berwick.& The house at Pannaway had no cellar .? The site of the Pannaway settlement was relatively bleak. It was not directly on the river. The settlements up the river, the one at Hil- ton's Point and the other at Newichwannock, if, as is probable, it was then in existence, seemed to have advantages that Pannaway had not. In 1631, Hum- phrey Chadbourne, acting under orders from certain or all of the Laconia Adventurers, directed artificers who had arrived in the country, in the building of a house, called "the Great House." 1,8 This was erected on the west bank of the upper harbor of the Piscat- aqua River. According to Mr. Charles W. Brewster, in "Rambles About Portsmouth," First Series, the Great House stood on what is now the southeast corner of Court Street, where it crosses Water Street in Portsmouth. The west shore of the main river, looking northward from the entrance of the upper harbor, is first low, and then rises moderately in a low hill, which edges the river, the rushing tide just below. This is a beauty spot of the whole Piscataqua. Here, on the south slope of this hill, Chadbourne built his house; and because of a profusion of strawberries found on this bank in early summer,11 the bank was called "Strawberry Banke," 3, 10 a name which for years identified the settlement, and which persisted
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until late in the century as the name of the colony that grew up around and because of the so-called Great House. This Great House was the beginning of Portsmouth. Thomas Bailey Aldrich has said, in "An Old Town by the Sea," Mr. Chadbourne "con- sciously or unconsciously sowed a seed from which a city has sprung."
In 1631, also, the proprietors were careful to pro- vide for the defence of the men they were sending to the Piscataqua, and the plantations these men were beginning. These proprietors sent over four cannon, given by a London merchant, which they directed their agents to mount at the most convenient place for a fort.3 These agents, accordingly, placed the can- non on the northeastern point of Great Island (New- castle), at the mouth of the harbor, about a bowshot back from the water's edge, by a high rock.3 The next year, 1632, the coast was alarmed by the news of a pirate, one Dixy Bull, who with fifteen others had rifled the fort at Pemaquid, to the eastward. 3,7 The early settlers on the Piscataqua must have felt the safer because of their cannon. Neale, with others, in four pinnaces and shallops, manned with forty men, and joined by twenty men in a bark from Boston (settled 1630), is reported to have journeyed to Pema- quid.7 The story goes that they did not meet Dixy Bull,9 but that they did make prisoner an Indian, who had been concerned with the murder of an Eng- lishman, and that they hanged him on their return.3
Probably the influx of new settlers and servants came largely with Neale, or shortly afterwards, 1630- 1633. A list of stewards and servants sent by Capt. John Mason has been handed down. One was George Vaughan, who remained but a short time in the Prov-
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
ince;8 a William Vaughan came shortly afterwards. Another was Reginald or Renald Fernald, who lived at Strawberry Bank, and who died on Peirce's Island in 1656.8 He had been a surgeon in the English navy, and was physician to the colony. Henry Sherburne came over in the ship "James," arriving in the Piscat- aqua June 12, 1632. He married Rebecca Gibbons, daughter of Ambrose Gibbons, November 13, 1637.8 William Seavey said, in a deposition, 1676, that he came as a fishmonger to the Isles of Shoals about a year before Captain Neale.8 Seavey had a grant of fifty acres in Rye in 1652, and was a selectman in Portsmouth in 1657,8 Portsmouth then including New- castle, Rye, Greenland and part of Newington. Ralph Gee kept Mason's cattle and was employed in making staves.8 Letters show that Roger Knight was on the Piscataqua before May, 1632. He was entertained by Ambrose Gibbons, and was of the group associated with Mason and the Laconia Adventurers. Another who came to the colony through Mason was Thomas Wonerton, or Wannerton, who, it is possible, came over with Neale. He had charge of the property of Gorges and Mason on the Piscataqua after Neale left, and also of the Great House at Strawberry Bank until about 1644.3,8 Winthrop is quoted as saying of Wannerton, that he had "been a soldier many years, and lived very wickedly." 8 Others sent over by Mason about 1631 were Francis Rand, William Berry, who is said to have been the first settler at Sandy Beach, Rye,8 and William Brackett.8 Anthony Brackett, who was killed by the Indians in 1691,4 settled in Straw- berry Bank before 1640. Alexander Jones, born in 1615, was the first owner of land in Kittery.8 He was a resident of Portsmouth in 1657, and of the Isles of
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
Shoals in 1661.8 William Chadbourne came in 1634 to build the mill at Newichwannock.8 He was the father of Humphrey Chadbourne, who came in 1631, and who built the Great House.8 Thomas Wolford had been the first settler at Charlestown, Massachu- setts, but removed to Strawberry Bank (Portsmouth), and later settled at Sagamore Creek.8 John Goddard came as a millwright in 1634, presumably to help William Chadbourne. Goddard owned a lot of land at Dover Neck in 1648.8 Thomas Withers, born in 1606, obtained a deed from Sir Ferdinando Gorges, of four hundred acres of land in Kittery, directly opposite Portsmouth, and eight hundred acres more at the head of Spruce Creek.8 John Peverly owned land at Ports- mouth in 1657.8 Francis Matthews, who married Thomasine Channon, November 22, 1622, in Devon- shire, came over in 1634.11 In 1637 he was given a lease of one hundred acres of land on the northwest side of Great Island (Newcastle), commonly called "Muskito Hall." 8 He signed the Exeter Combination in 1639, and he was living at Oyster River Point, where he died in 1648.8
The surnames of those stewards and servants sent by Capt. John Mason to his Piscataqua territory is as follows:
Neal Gibbins or Gibbons
Furnald Gee or Goe
Comock
Cooper Chadborn
Raymond
Williams
Mathews
Vaughan
Rand Johnson
Wonerton
Jocelyn
Ellins
Norton
Baldwin
Lane
Spencer
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
Furrall
Langstaff
Herd
Berry
Chatherton
Walford
Knight
Moore
Sherborn
Beal
Goddard
James
Fernald
Jones
Withers
Ault
Canney
Bracket
Symonds
Newt
Peverly
Wall
Seavey
Brakin
Also eight Danes and twenty-two women.7
Apparently a number of individuals lived together in each of the widely separated houses at Pannaway, at Strawberry Bank, at Hilton's Point and at Ne- wichwannock. It was a lonely country, and the pali- saded design of house at Pannaway and at Newichwan- nock was probably followed at Strawberry Bank and at Hilton's plantation. Gradually, outlying buildings. and houses arose, and daring spirits slowly erected new home units away from the first centers. The Indians were a source of danger, more imagined than real, at this earliest stage of the settlement, yet sav- ages they were, and not to be trusted. The Massa- chusetts settlers had already had varying difficulties. with the Indians, but so far as the records show, the Piscataqua settlements had no real difficulty with their Indian neighbors until 1636, when slight encounters with the Pequots are reported at Eliot.14 Even then the struggle between white man and Indian does not seem to have been of much moment on the banks of the Piscataqua. The settlers wanted to trade with the Indians. Ambrose Gibbons gave them shelter and food, and they were of reasonably friendly disposition ..
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
No great Indian difficulties seem to have arisen on the Piscataqua until much later.
Contact with England developed considerably from 1630 on. We know of a small English ship that ar- rived in the Piscataqua in 1631 with provisions, and carrying also some Frenchmen, sent over to make salt, presumably for curing the fish at Pannaway.7 In 1633 seventeen fishing vessels came to the Isles of Shoals 9 and most, if not all, of them probably anchored in the Piscataqua before they sailed home again. The Laconia Adventurers in England kept up a mail service with their agents on the river. There were, also, those in England who were interested in Hilton's settlement at Dover Point, and who doubtless kept in touch with it.
The same men who had secured the Laconia grant 2 - namely, Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Capt. John Mason and seven others - obtained, November 3, 1631,7 an important patent or grant called "The Grant and Confirmation of Pescataway." 10 They obtained this grant from the Council for New England. The grant recited that the nine men specified were confirmed in their title to "all that house and chief habitation situate and being at Pascataway als Pascataquack als Passaquacke in New England, wherein Capt. Walter Neale and ye colony with him now doth, or lately did reside, together with the gardens and corne ground occupied and planted by the said colonie, and the salt works already begun;"10 also, "all that land beginning upon the seacoast five miles to the westward of or from said habitation or plantation, being in the latitude 43º or thereabouts, in the harbor of Pascata- quack, upwards to the plantation of Edward Hilton and thence westward"10 "in ye middle of the river
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
and through midle of ye bay or lake of Pasquacack [Great Bay], also called Pascaquack,"10 thence to the river of Pascassocke (Exeter River), at the westerly head of Great Bay, and thence to the sea, to the start- ing point. This grant also included the "Isles of Shoales," so spelt in this deed.10 It is said that the object of this deed was to define the dividing line between the Hilton patent and the lower settlements. 20
This deed was granted, as it recited, because of the cost to Capt. John Mason, Sir Ferdinando Gorges and the seven others,7 due to divers special services done by them for the plantations, such as the "mak- ing of clapboard and pipe staves, making of salt pans and salt, transporting of vines for making wines, searching for iron ore, being all busenisse of very great consequence for causing of many soules, both men, women and boys, a store of shipps to be em- ployed thither, all which has cost them, as we are creditably informed, £3000 and upwards."10 This deed indicated that the Laconia, Adventurers had thoughts of the probable development of their up- river plantation at the expense of Pannaway, which the deed rather implied was to be abandoned. This deed also indicated extensive communication between the Piscataqua and England.
The Laconia Adventurers spent much time and money on their schemes, but after two years of effort and of unfulfilled hopes, they abandoned their project, disheartened,2 and "the major part of them either re- linquished the design or sold their shares to Sir Ferdi- nando Gorges and Capt. John Mason."3 They did not, however, resign or in any way give up their original patent, and claims under this patent caused much litigation for years after, almost to the Revolution.2
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
In 1633 smallpox spread to Pascataquack, as Mas- sachusetts then called, indiscriminately, all of the Piscataqua River settlements. This same report states that all but one or two of the Indians on the river died from this epidemic.9
As of 1633, there exists considerable information bear- ing on the Piscataqua settlers during the effort of the Laconia Adventurers. This, to a considerable extent, comes from letters, copies of which are easily available. These sketch a picture of the lives of the men of the Piscataqua, 1630-1634, and outline their hardships and their contact with the home country. One of these let- ters was from Ambrose Gibbons (spelt Gibbins), writ- ten at the palisaded house at Newichwannock (spelt Newichwanicke), to one of the Laconia Adventurers in England. This letter reads: "You may perhaps think that fewer men would serve me but I have sometimes on C (100) Indians from far and neybors. These that I can I set to pale in ground for corne and garden. I have digged a wel within the palizado, where is good water. More men I could have and more employ. These four men with me is Charles Knell, Thomas Clarke, Steven Kidder and Thomas Crockitt. Three of them is to have for their wages until the first of March, £4 per peese, and the other for the year £6, which in your behalf I have promised to satisfy in money or beaver at ten shillings per pound. The vines that were planted will come to little. I have sent you a note of the beaver taken by me at Newichwanick, and how it hath gon from me."3 Another letter from Gibbons, 1631, says: "A good husband with his wife to tend the cattle and to make butter and cheese will be profitable; for maides they are soon gone in this country." 3 A letter from Thomas Eyre, one of the
Interior, Jackson House
Published through the courtesy of The Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
Laconia Adventurers in England, written to Ambrose Gibbons, and dated the last of May, 1631, speaks of a letter written from Plimouth, New England, to Eyre, dated April 8, 1630. This same letter refers to Gibbons as having said that he had entertained Roger Knight. It also refers to letters from Gibbons, dated from Pas- cataquacke, July 21, 1630, and August 14, 1630. The same letter from Eyre says that he, Eyre, was about to send out by the bark "Warwicke" to the Piscat- aqua a factor to take charge of trade goods and a soldier "for discovery." This letter intimates that the "Pide-Cowe" also had sailed, or was about to sail, for the Piscataqua with provisions and commodities.7 This letter from Eyre to Gibbons, dated May, 1631, says: "I wish all your wives were with you, and that so many of you as desire wives have such as they de- sire; for the adventurers desire not to be troubled with quarterly payments. I take notice of your com- plaints for the want of trade goods, and so much as lieth in me it shall be otherwise, especially if you send us returns. I hope you will find something to relode the 'Pide-Cowe' and the 'Warwicke.'3 I will now put on the sending of you the moddell of a saw mill that you may have one going. Your wife and child, Roger Knight's wife and one wife more we have already sent you, and more you shall have as you write for them. You write for another mason. We hope you will find out some good mines, which will be welcome news unto us." 3 The letter also states that the La- conia Adventurers had received a letter from Captain Neale. Another letter from the Laconia Adventurers in England, written after Neale's departure, and towards the end of the venture by the Laconia Adven- turers, reads: "The Adventurers have bine soe dis-
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
couraged by the small returnes sent thither by Capt. Neal, Mr. Herbert, etc. Wee praie you to take care of our house at Newichwannick and to looke well to our vines. Also you may take some of our swine and goates, which we praie you to preserve. We have committed the chief care of our house at Pascattaway to Mr. Godfrie and written unto Mr. Warnerton to take care of our house at Strawberry Bancke. Our desire is that Mr. Godfrie, Mr. Wannerton and you should joyne lovingly together in all things for our good, and to advise us what our best course will be to doe another year." 3
The letter to Ambrose Gibbons, dated at London, December, 1632, and written by the Laconia Adven- turers, in speaking of the discouragement of the La- conia Adventurers, reads: "wee have written to Capt. Neale to dismiss the household."3 This same letter provides that those who needed the right to stay on the land might do so, with the sanction of Gibbons, Godfrie and Neale. A letter from Gibbons to the Laconia Company, dated from the Piscataqua June 24, 1633, says: "I have delivered unto Mr. John Raymon [who was probably the factor referred to in Eyre's letter], seventy-six pounds, four ounses of beaver, ten otters, six musquashes, and on martin more."3 This letter states that Captain Neale had three hundred and fifty-eight pounds, eleven ounces of beaver and otter, seventeen martins, one black fox skin, one other fox skin, three raccoon skins, fourteen musquashes, two of them with stones.7
A letter written by Gibbons to the company, dated Newichawinick, July 13, 1633, says: "Mr. Wanerton hath the charge of the house at Pascatawa, and hath
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
with him William Cooper, Rafe Gee, Roger Knight and his wife, William Dermit and on boy. I have taken into my hands all the trade goods that remains of John Raymone's and Mr. Vaughan's. You complain of your returnes. A plantation must be furnished with cattle and good herd hands, and necessaries for them." 7 Gibbons wrote, in 1633, that there was "no amity be- tween the west countriemen and them" (meaning Lon- doners).3 This was in reply to a criticism that his returns of the fishing were not satisfactory. Gibbons says: "A Londoner is not for fishing." He adds: "Those that have been here this three year some of them hath neither meat, money nor clothes. For my- self, my wife and child and four men, we have but half a barrel of corne: beef and pork I have not had but on peese this three months, nor beare this four months. I have for two and twenty months had but two barrels of beare and two barrels and four booshel of malt." 3 All these letters are worth reading in full. They draw a picture of the situation pertaining to the settlers of the Piscataqua, with some humor in it, no very vigor- ous initiative, and no results satisfactory either to the backers of the venture which brought the settlers there, nor to the settlers themselves.
The Laconia Adventurers had used the "Warwick" and the "Pied-Cowe" as their vessels for communi- cation with the Piscataqua.12 In 1631 the "Warwick," John Dunton, master, was in the Piscataqua again, arriving September 9.12 She sailed for Virginia Sep- tember 19, 1631, and then came back from Virginia to the Piscataqua the next year, and delivered there seven hundred barrels of corn. Sailing from the Piscat- aqua again for Virginia she stopped at the Isles of
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EARLY PORTSMOUTH HISTORY
Shoals on the way back.12 In the spring of 1632 an- other ship, the "John," was sent over to the Piscat- aqua. 12 That year, also, the company chartered the "Lyon's Whelp" of London. She reached the Piscat- aqua the last part of April.12 In May, 1634, Gorges and Mason sent the "Pide-Cowe" again to the Piscat- aqua River.12 This time they directed her also to call at Agamenticus, now York. Henry Josselyn was sent out by Mason on her as steward, and it was on this trip that William Chadbourne also came to the Piscataqua. With him were James Wall and John Goddard, all three being carpenters with whom Mason had made a contract for five years, to build his saw- mill at Newichwannock. 12 Josselyn "described the whole coast as a mere wilderness, with here and there a few huts scattered by the seaside." 18 Thirty years after its settlement Portsmouth boasted only fifty to sixty families.18 Josselyn succeeded Neale as Gover- nor, representing Mason as such in the lower planta- tion, when Neale left in 1633.12 Probably Thomas Cammock also came with Chadbourne. 10
The "Pide-Cowe" arrived in Piscataqua Harbor, July 8, 1634, and anchored at Newichwannock, July 13.8, 12 She took on iron "ore" from the shores of the Piscataqua,12 and landed some finely bred Denmark cattle. The cove where they landed, about half a mile below the falls, has been since known as "Cow Cove." 8, 13
There were probably at this time a considerable number of settlers along the shores of the Piscataqua River, who had purchased or who had hired land from the Laconia Company. The first corn mill in New England to be operated by water power was erected
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THE LACONIA ADVENTURERS
at Newichwannock.8 This was sent over in July, 1634, with another one for "Aquamenticus." Gorges and Mason sent them.7, 12
The owners of the patent covered by Hilton's settle- ment at Dover Point wished their patent surveyed. Mason, at the same time, wished the lower river ter- ritory surveyed, and also his larger patent running up to the Massachusetts line on the west. At this time Captain Wiggin represented the English owners of the Hilton's Point settlement.2 Acting under instructions, in 1633, Neale and Wiggin are said to have surveyed their respective territories.7 Having done so, they wrote to Capt. John Mason in England, asking that he present their report to the patentees of Laconia and Hilton's Point. This letter, as handed down, has been claimed a forgery, made much later than its date, and for political purposes. Even so, it contains interesting information of an early date. The letter reads as follows: We "have surveyed the river from the mouth of the harbor to Squamscutt Falls, and from the har- bor's mouth to the Massachusetts bounds, and find that your patents will not afford more than for two townes in the river of Piscataway. And the remainder will make another good towne, having much salt marsh in it. And because you would have four townes, named as you desired, wee have treated with a gentle- man who had purchased a tract of land of the Indians at Squamscott Falls, the gentleman's name being Wheelwright, and he was to name said plantation Exeter. And the other two townes in the river, the one North-ham, and Portsmouth the other, bounded as follows, viz: Portsmouth runs from the harbor's mouth by the seaside to the entrance of a little river between
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