USA > New Hampshire > Merrimack County > Concord > History of Concord, New Hampshire, from the original grant in seventeen hundred and twenty-five to the opening of the twentieth century, Volume I > Part 7
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The Two-Story Square House.
1 Woods and By-Ways of New England, p. 86.
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
5. The Two-Story Square House. This affords another type of dwelling intro- duced to villages and large farms early in the last century. It was usually well built by well-to-do proprietors, a fact which accounts for the good condition in which it is generally found. The most marked features in its construction are a large, square chimney in its cen- tre, bisecting its ridge line as it emerges from the roof, around which the rooms of both stories are so arranged as to allow fireplaces in most or all of them. Admission on the front side is through a shallow entry between the chimney and the outside door, while access to the The Nearly Flat Roof House. second story is had by a stairway of so many rectangular turnings as to make it a matter of some uncertainty whether a person, starting
from the bottom in a sober condition, would be able to walk without staggering when he had reached the top.
6. The nearly Flat Roof. House, without Gables, also came into use about the same time as the type last mentioned. Its roof, pitching from a short ridge line in four directions, was pierced by a chimney at each end of the building. This style seems to have been a faint imitation of the three- story colonial mansions of the coast towns, The Gable Front House. many of which still survive in perfect preservation, and attest the prosperity of the country about the time of their erection. Its depth was that of a single room, and its main entrance was midway of its front wall. It was quite often enlarged by the addition of an L in its rear.
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7. The Gable Front House made its first appearance about seventy years ago. Un- like the former, its front elevation was formed by having a gable end face the street. From this it extended back in form of a parallelogram until the de- sired room was secured. The front entrance was generally through a re-
The Mansard or French Roof House,
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PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT.
cessed porch which opened on one side to a long, narrow hall, which afforded immediate access to the rooms of the first story, and by a straight stairway to those above. Scores of these are still in use, but few have been built in recent years.
8. The Mansard or French Roof House. This type began to be erected in Concord just before the Civil War, but in no great num- bers, inasmuch as it was expensive and best adapted to the wants of towns where large estates abounded. It may be said of this style of house that it allows of imposing elevations and the utilization of almost every cubic foot of interior space.
The Queen Anne House.
9. The Queen Anne House. This was intro- duced some thirty years ago. It allows greater freedom of architectural treatment than any other. Its steep roofs, numerous gables and dormer windows, its porches, piazzas, and L's, often give to a house of this type the appear- ance of a cluster of buildings which have grad- ually grown by degrees into an harmonious whole, rather than of a building of one design and construction. Coneord has several good specimens of this type, of which it is unnecessary to say that, while no two of them are alike, they all bear a typical resemblance to each other.
10. The Colonial is another type of about the same period as that of the style just mentioned. It is not a new one. It is, rather, the renaissance of the old colonial mansion so common a hundred years ago, modified by the addi- tion of porticoes, verandas, and bay win- dows-a type more showy and palatial than any heretofore mentioned. Its contrast with the log cabin forcibly suggests the great advance in wealth and improved housing in this city since its settlement, while the intermediate styles mark the steps along which these have been reached.
The Colonial.
11. The Romanesque. Of this style, which succeeded to the Grecian and other styles in vogue upon the downfall of the Roman empire, Concord ean show but few examples. It is highly picturesque, and, iu general appearance, foreign. It also varies greatly in minor points in the different European countries in which it has been developed.
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
In England charming specimens of it in its simpler forms may be found classed as Norman. It is not well adapted to the more com- mon requirements of domestic life, and is most often chosen for build- ings of a public character and for imposing private mansions.
By a more particular examination of the diversities in styles of the Concord dwellings, the foregoing number of types might be enlarged, but it seems unnecessary. It should, however, be stated that there was a kindred variation in the types of the town's meeting-houses. The first consisted of a simple, one-story structure of logs, which served as a town house, schoolhouse, and meet- ing-house. The second, built for the standing or- der, when The Romanesque. " Church and State" prevailed in New Hampshire, was originally seen in a two-story, square structure, having walls pierced by numerous large windows, and subsequently enlarged by exterior additions and a steeple. To this type, soon after the passage of the toleration act, succeeded a third of one story, with long side windows, gable front, and steeple. Of the various renais- sance types which have succeeded, the limits of this chapter forbid particular description.
FISH AND GAME.
FRANK BATTLES.
The ancient plantation of Penny Cook, the township of Rumford, now the flourishing city of Concord, and its immediate vicinity, from a topographical standpoint has been, and still is, admirably adapted to the propagation and growth of many of the most valuable of the edible animals, birds, and fishes. The varied woodland growth on the surrounding hillsides, interspersed with the necessary swales and brushy pastures, afford abundant protection and food for the ruffed grouse, commonly known as the partridge, and the woodcock, -- two of the most important game birds of the state,-while in the same covers foxes, coney rabbits, squirrels, raccoons, freely breed and flourish. The numberless sparkling streams, which have their origin in the springy soil of these elevated localities, form natural breeding places and homes for the peerless brook trout, always eagerly sought. The half dozen or more ponds within the city limits, and many others in close proximity, have furnished in the past, and yield to-day to the persistent fisherman, handsome strings of the more common yet highly esteemed pickerel, perch, and pout ; and in a few of them, as well as in the Merrimack river, the result of transplanting from other waters, black bass may be said to be numerous.
Animals and birds recognize no human boundaries over which they must not roam or fly, and the fish inhabiting the waters in this vicinity are not cognizant of any town lines which may extend to, or cross, their domain. So that whatever is said of the fish and game of this immediate locality is equally applicable to the section about Concord as well. It may be stated that the all-round sportsman can safely make his headquarters in Concord, from which within an easy dis- tance he will be sure of pleasure to a reasonable extent, unless he wishes to engage in deer hunting or to try his luck with landlocked salmon. Deer are now frequently seen in Merrimack county, and in several instances have invaded the precincts of Concord, but they are protected by the law the year round in this part of the state. The efforts to stock the waters of Concord with landlocked salmon are of recent date, but even now show satisfactory results.
If the reader will examine the records made by the authorities in years long gone by he will find that the titles of the land lying on the Merrimack river, which back to about 1732 was divided into dis-
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
tricts, were conveyed in the crude though unmistakable language of the times, and that the boundary lines of many such districts began and ended with such and such a tree, giving the name, whether of white pine, red oak, or other variety; and it requires no stretch of the imagination to infer that when the Indians first came upon and decided to remain on what is now the rich arable interval land bor- dering upon the river, they found it covered with a bushy growth with here and there an area of woods, consisting of pine, maple, oak, walnut, and other species.
As the character of the American Indian ever prompted him to eke out his existence with as little labor as possible, one of the first acts on his arrival in the neighborhood was to burn over the lands for the double purpose of clearing valuable space on which to raise his absolutely necessary corn, and to change original rank growth to suc- culent verdure, in order that the deer inhabiting the woods adjoining might be enticed into situations which would render their capture a comparatively easy matter. That the Penacook tribe, domiciled in the main as they were for years on territory which is now included within the limits of Concord, subsisted largely on fish and game will be readily admitted from the nature of things; but, with the advent of the white man, in accordance with established methods of civiliza- tion, records and narratives of current events and conditions were begun and continued, so that from the day of his coming there is at hand information from which the student can inform himself concerning the happenings of any particular period of time. From these records, antedating, of course, the memory of persons now living, much of interest relating to fish and game of those early days and their capture for food may be culled.
The gunner of to-day follows his pointer or setter with nothing to divert his attention from the pleasure he is enjoying. The fox and rabbit hunter listens undisturbed to the music of his hounds in the most unfrequented places. The coon hunter, during the darkest nights, plods through the trackless forests and over rocky pastures, ascends the tallest trees to kill his quarry, with no possibility of harm coming to him. The angler enters the water or crawls along the slimiest places with no thought of danger. The sportsman of other days or the head of the family in quest of food did not, however, roam the woodlands with the same immunity or without sense of fear. In the carly times the country about this beautiful city abounded in savage and obnoxious animals and vermin.
In the records referred to it is learned that determined efforts on the part of the settlers to rid the country of pests were absolutely necessary, not alone to insure their own safety, but for the protection
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FISH AND GAME.
of their stock as well; and organized hunting parties were the order of the day for many years, to scour the woods and destroy as many as possible of the bears, catamounts, wolves, and rattlesnakes which infested the township. These efforts were encouraged to the fullest possible extent by the town officials, who were authorized by vote of the inhabitants year after year to pay a bounty on all such animals and reptiles destroyed. The sum paid for the killing of wolves varied with different years from three pounds to one pound for a full- grown wolf and from one pound ten shillings to ten shillings for a whelp. For each rattlesnake killed there was paid from sixpence to a shilling. Year after year the warfare was kept up, with the result that the settlers finally had the satisfaction of seeing the " varmints " practically exterminated, the rattlesnake lasting the longest, as it was well into the forties of the nineteenth century ere it ceased to be a pest in some localities. Who now, as he dwells in the city of his choice, enjoying the comforts which he can obtain here and which are made possible by the efforts of the rugged yeomanry he calls his ancestors, can but admire their perseverance in the face of obstacles which to-day would be considered unsurmountable ?
There is no doubt that the early settlers and their immediate descendants depended largely on fish and game to supply their tables. There was a sameness and plainness in their daily fare, to say nothing of its limited quantity, which made the fish and game they could readily catch and kill the only luxuries with which they could supply their larder. Deer were fairly plentiful ; hares, grouse, and wild pigeons were abundant ; the river at the proper season was alive with salmon and shad ; the brooks contained large numbers of trout ; and the ponds yielded liberally of the coarser native varieties of fish. These conditions continued until the march of progress and the increase of population marked the beginning of the manufacturing era, when the building of dams across the river diminished the large run of salmon and shad to their spawning places at the headwaters. The gradual increase in the number of these structures, some of them so built as to absolutely prevent the passage of fish, finally caused them to disappear completely from the Merrimack, although it was not until the year 1898 that the salmon gave it up entirely, several fish of that species, gigantic in size, having been seen that year in the river abreast the city.
The passenger pigeons, which our forefathers and their descendants to within a few years held in such high estcem, and which inhabited the entire country east and west in such immense numbers as to be reckoned by the million, have been exterminated by the ruthless slaughter carried on among them at their roosting, breeding, and feed-
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
ing grounds, so that to-day the only specimens which certainly exist are in confinement.
With these exceptions, and that of the upland plover (all migratory species), the quantity of fish and game around Concord will .compare favorably with that of any ancient day of which there is any record. This statement may be questioned, but is based upon an active expe- rience of nearly fifty years in the woodlands of New England and other sections of the country in pursuit of game and fish, and in cor- roboration it may be said that during each of several days' shooting in the fall of 1900 as many partridges were started as had ever been noted in any one day of previous years. The same abundance has also been noted in other recent years, and it is believed that partridges are as plentiful as ever and will continue to be abundant so long as pine forests grow and laws to prevent snaring and trapping are en- forced. Occasionally there has been a year when some disease has reduced their numbers, and it has then taken two or three seasons to fully recover the losses, but the conditions are still most favorable to their propagation.
The woodcock, another migratory bird, has rapidly decreased in numbers apparently with the advance of civilization, but the season of 1900 witnessed a remarkably large flight of these birds. The same abundance has been observed at intervals of a few years apart, with proof almost every year that a large flight had passed along, making but a brief stop in this vicinity. In any event, the fact that this variety breeds exclusively in the north and is killed by the thou- sand in the south during the winter, shows that they are still very much in evidence, although on their southern passage they may some years elude the Concord wing shots.
The "highlander," or upland plover, to within twenty-five years, passed over the intervals by hundreds on their southern flight from their breeding places on the hills in the adjacent north. They are still more than abundant in the west and are by no means scarce here.
It may seem extravagant to assert that there are as many trout in this vicinity as there were a hundred years ago, but is it not so? In olden times the farmer or his boy went to the brook and took out enough for a mess and was satisfied. To-day the fisherman makes a day of it and cleans up the brook for the time being. There are hun- dreds of fishermen now where there was only the farmer or his boy to fish in those days, and still the trout hold out, as there are many fine strings taken in every year very close to Concord.
Black bass have superseded the pickerel in many waters, but this has been accomplished by the hand of man in the line of supposed
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FISH AND GAME.
benefit. Large sums of public and private moneys have been ex- pended in the artificial propagation of food fish to keep up the supply. These expenditures have been going on now for a number of years with varying degrees of success towards obtaining the desired result. Within the past few years, also, quite extensive efforts have been made to introduce into this, as well as other sections of New Hamp- shire, valuable game birds other than the native varieties, notably the quail and pheasants. The hopes of those interested, so far as the quail is concerned, have been more than realized, as flocks of these beauti- ful little birds are reported in all directions, and not a few of them have been brought to bag during the last three or four shooting sea- sons. The result of raising and liberating pheasants around Concord and other localities in New England has been very far from satisfac- tory. The experiment, however, has not proved a complete failure, although generally believed to have been so.
To sum up then, with the changes that have been noted and with the additional statement that the coney rabbit has driven out and supplanted the hare and that the gray squirrels have not held their own against the woodman's slaughter of the chestnut forests, the vis- itors to the woodlands and the waters of this vicinity in this the beginning of the twentieth century, will not find it so vastly different in its natural history from what his ancestors found it at the begin- ning of the preceding one. Wherever original forests, second growth and wild uninhabitable lands are found, there will flourish animals and birds, the edible with the worthless, and in the public ponds of the state, under wise protection, valuable fish will breed and thrive.
In no part of the state has greater interest been taken in fish and game than in Concord and its immediate vicinity. Here was organ- ized the first practical fish and game league of the state. It is true there was an earlier league organized in Cheshire county, but it was limited in its character and was largely a social organization. Years ago, in the palmy days of the late John B. Clarke, there was a state league, and work attempted under that well-known pioneer was of practical value. Later on, the Merrimack County Fish and Game League was organized February 15, 1883, with the writer as tempo- rary chairman, who outlined the possibilities in the line of sport that might be derived through concentrated action on the part of those interested. The meeting for organization was held at Union hall, White's opera house, and was largely attended. The organization was perfected by the choice of Thomas A. Pilsbury of Concord as president, Walter Aiken of Franklin, Henry McFarland, and Dr. F. A. Stillings of Concord, vice-presidents, John M. Hill of Concord, treasurer, and James M. Morris of Concord, secretary, with an execu-
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
tive committee representative of various sections of the county. The activity of this league and the co-operation of the other leagues of the state, with the wise counsel and valuable assistance of the state commis- sioners, have secured a code of laws for the protection of fish and game, legislation wise in its inception, because of the intimate con- nection of sport of this character with the largely increasing summer business of New Hampshire.
By way of appendix to the foregoing it should be said that sev- eral fine salmon were taken with rod and reel in Long pond during the season of 1902, the largest one, weighing just above fifteen pounds, being captured by Harrison A. Roby.
GENERAL HISTORY. NARRATIVE SKETCH.
AMOS HADLEY.
CHAPTER I.
SCENE OF THE HISTORY .- ABORIGINAL OCCUPATION.
The scene of the following historical narration lies within that por- tion of the present domain of New Hampshire which anciently bore the name of Penacook. This appellation of varied orthography, with civilized softening of savage gutturals, was sometimes applied to a region whose limits cannot now with certainty be defined. That region probably extended, in undefined width, along both sides of the Merrimack river, with the mouth of the Soucook, or the Suncook, in its southern line of demarcation, and that of the Contoocook in its northern. Out of this tract was subsequently carved for civilized settlement, a restricted grant having definite bounds, and bearing the same name-Penacook, as the Indian called "the crooked place," formed by the singularly picturesque meanderings of the Merrimack, or " the place of the rapid current." In this locality have occurred the events of savage and civilized occupation which make up the History of Concord.
In Penacook was the special abode of the Indian tribe bearing that name. The historic light of the seventeenth century falls only in flecks upon aboriginal life in the valley of the Merrimack, as the sum- mer sunlight, in that distant day, must have flecked the wigwam or the pathway of the dusky hunter in the dark, primeval forest. It is historically certain, however, that the tribe occupying the soil of the present Concord was the leading one among kindred tribes that dwelt along the Merrimack and tributaries northward to Lake Winnepesaukee and beyond, and southward to the great bend near Pawtucket Falls. Those subordinates bearing such specific names as the Winnepesaukees, the Ossipees, the Amoskeags, the Souhegans, the Nashuas, and the Wamesits, or Pawtuckets, may, perhaps, be more properly characterized as bands than as tribes, and all of them Penacooks, with headquarters at the seat of the leading tribe. Possibly, too, the Indians living by the Merrimack, eastward to the sea-including the Squamscots and the Piscataquas, with the Accomintas and others along the western edge
6
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HISTORY OF CONCORD.
of Maine, and others still, as the Wachusetts upon the northern rim of Massachusetts-were kindred to the Penacooks, as surely they were confederate subjects of the same grand sachemship.1
The Penacooks, warlike representatives of the Algonquins, were in irreconcilable feud with the Mohawks, the fierce representatives of the Iroquois. In the days of their strength, these men of the Merrimack not only waged defensive war on the incursions of their traditional foes from beyond the Hudson, but sometimes avenged themselves in war offensive. At their first historical appearance, about 1621, they had been much weakened by war, and other causes-among which may have been the dread disease of 1616, which prevailed along the seashore and at an unknown distance inland. Tradition, without assigning dates, locates three ancient forts at the headquarters of the Penacooks: one upon the west bank of the river in Fort Eddy plain ; another upon the east bank opposite, on the crest of Sugar Ball bluff ; the third also on the east side of the Merrimack, near Sewall's island. Undoubtedly the Sugar Ball fort, occupying its excellent position, had for its special object defense against the Mohawks; and with it is connected the story of a desperate battle. As was not unusual, the Mohawks were paying these eastern parts a visit of mischief, and a party of them had suffered repulse in an encounter with the Pena- cooks. The latter, in precaution against their persistent foes, with- drew, men, women, and children, within the fort on Sugar Ball, along the strongly-built walls of which were stored their baskets of newly- harvested corn. The Mohawks, the more enraged for their repulse, appeared in force on Fort Eddy plain, and took threatening position. A time of mutual watch and of mutual defiance passed ; for the Pen- acooks dared not "fight in the field, nor the Mohawks to attack the fort."2 Then it was that a Mohawk was seen carelessly strolling
across Sugar Ball plain, southward of the bluff, and at its foot. The decoy drew out of the fort warrior after warrior, in hot pursuit, while- he sped away to the river. Meanwhile, the main force of the wily Mohawks, having crossed the river above, had, by a roundabout march, drawn near the Penacook stronghold, and hidden there. With a war- whoop more startling than that of the pursuers in the plain, they at last sprung from their ambush upon the fort, now thinned of defend- ers. But the warriors, lured into deceptive chase, were not slow to return, and to join obstinate battle for the possession of their fortress and its precious contents.
Tantalizing tradition tells not definitely the result. It leaves, how- ever, the inference of an indecisive battle, in which both sides suffered
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1 See St. Aspenquid, in note at close of chapter; also, Potter's Manchester, 28.
2 Bouton's Concord, 20.
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SCENE OF THE HISTORY.
severely ; the baffled " Mohawks leaving their dead and wounded on the ground "1 with those of the demoralized Penacooks. The diver- sity of skulls among the human bones unearthed in later times, in what is supposed to have been a burying-ground, northward of the fort, denotes a promiscuous burial of the Algonquin and the Iroquois dead. The traditional statement, "that from the fatal day the al- ready reduced force of the Penacooks was broken into fragments, and scattered," 2 seems exaggerated in view of what is known from other sources of information. The day may have been one of serious dis- aster ; and may help to account for the weakened condition of the Penacooks in 1623, as well as tend to suggest the date of the battle as being toward the end of the sixteenth century or early in the seventeenth.
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