USA > New Hampshire > Sullivan County > Goshen > History of Goshen, New Hampshire : settled, 1769, incorporated, 1791 > Part 9
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EARLY FAMILIES
assumed that young Chandler cast about for a more suitable location in which to begin his home. He therefore, figuring sagely, sold the lot to Samuel Gunnison, Sr., March 26, 1774; married daughter Margaret, June 16 following, and on July 16, 1775, one year later, for a consideration of five shillings, re- ceived a deed from John Fisher, Esq., real estate promoter of Salem, Mass., to one hundred acres of land, "Lot Number Twelve . . on the South side of the Province Road" in the present town of Newbury. Here he lived ever after, raising up fourteen children and establishing an enviable reputation for energy and integrity of character .* If not to be classed indeed as one of Goshen's first settlers, it is certain that the young Chandlers lived in the bride's parental home that first year following their marriage.
On the same date that Joseph and Margaret Chandler cast in their lot with Fishersfield's development, Samuel Gunnison, Jr., Margaret's brother, bought the farm adjoining theirs, to be later joined by another kinsman, Dea. William Gunnison.
Saville owed much to Samuel Gunnison, Sr., and displayed a rare sense of appreciation. A captain's commission, 10th. Com- pany, bestowed upon him by Col. Benjamin Bellows, March 15, 1776, might have seemed honor enough, but his fellow-citizens went further and repeatedly elected him to town-office. Thus he was chosen Clerk at Saville's first recorded town-meeting, April 22, 1778, and was also then elected to the board of Select- men. The following year he was re-elected to both offices, a record repeated again in 1782.
In 1781 Capt. Gunnison was empowered by the New Hamp- shire General Assembly to call a meeting to choose officers for the newly-incorporated Wendell, the old name of Saville being thereby discontinued. His name headed the list of those praying for incorporation in the preceding January and a significant statement was made therein. "Your Petitioners have exerted
*Old Kittery, p. 316-17, states: "Joseph Chandler, b. in Kittery 20 Oct. 1747, m. 16 June 1774 Margaret Gunnison. He had a brother Eliphalet who m. widow Hannah Seavey in Oct. 1782 at Saco. Traditions say his father was killed by the Indians. Was he the William Chandler who m. Mary Pope?" William's estate was adm. 1756.
His Parker lot has been owned by the writer for over thirty years.
By the same authority, Mrs. Benjamin Rand, born Catherine Chandler, ninth child of William, Sr., and Elizabeth (Lucy) Chandler, is proven to be Joseph's aunt.
99
HISTORY OF GOSHEN, N. H.
them selves on all Occasions in the present War, greatly beyond their Abilities," it read, "and have signalized their Attachment to the State of New Hampshire and its Jurisdiction - . "* It was a period when Saville's neighbors were denying their attach- ment to New Hampshire and its jurisdiction.
The famed "Vermont Controversy," raging since June, 1778, when sixteen towns on the east side of the Connecticut River had withdrawn from New Hampshire and joined themselves to the state of Vermont, had now reached a climax of threat and counter-threat, merging into actual violence. It is a matter of record that Benjamin Giles, Esq., of Newport, favored the claims of Vermont, as instructed by the town March 29, 1781, when Newport united with Vermont. He was afterward arrested in company with Nathaniel S. Prentiss of Alstead by New Hamp- shire authorities, but was rescued from custody by the people of Charlestown "in a most extraordinary manner." (Parmelee) Fortunately, tolerance at length prevailed and Mr. Giles ably resumed his allegiance to New Hampshire, his honor undimmed.
An interesting sidelight is thrown upon the records of 1782, when, in December, Capt. Gunnison was chosen one of a com- mittee of three to "give instructions to the Representative," Benjamin Giles, Esq., who had been elected to the position by his home-town of Newport, classed that year with Croydon and Saville. There is no evidence that Capt. Gunnison played a more direct part in Saville's loyalty than did his fellow-towns- men. The very fact that so many of them still held dear the old Portsmouth ties of kinship as well as of association would have voided all thought of their abandonment.
Capt. Gunnison's war-record is already familiar. His reports show a mastery of terse description. He died May 14, 1806, in his 86th year. Mrs. Alice Gunnison, his wife, preceded him on July 5, 1804, at eighty years of age. Both are buried at North Goshen.
*State Papers, Vol. 13, p. 495.
CHAPTER VII
Indian Days
A CLIMB up Mount Sunapee makes easy the task of imag- ining what the country was like before white men ventured into its fastnesses. The same great trees rise from a tangle of underbrush and fallen logs; the same expanse of forest greets the eye where vistas open out; Sunapee Lake, at 1091 feet ele- vation, uptilts its blue expanse to the north, just as in Indian days. If cottages appear along the lakeshore, or New London's fine street breasts its broad hilltop in your line of vision, a slight shift of position gives you again an unbroken wilderness.
Woods pretty much hide the dwarfed fields and their farm- houses; they hide the roads, the little, white-painted villages, even Goshen Four Corners, though set upon a lofty hillside itself; the main village lies in a valley, not expecting to be seen.
The woods crowd in everywhere, of maple, beech, oak and the birches, both white and yellow, set out in relief by the lighter green of hemlock and pine on lower levels and, all about, the black of spruce, for Mount Sunapee stands up into the spruce-belt, which has a meaning to botanists.
Nevertheless, there were open meadows in Indian days. Sturoc describes the "small patches of natural meadow which yields a kind of wire, or spear, grass." The Sugar River meadows were found in Newport with the first arrival of Eastman, the trapper, and there is no doubt they existed along Cold River and in Lempster. In Claremont especially the big meadows encouraged early settlers in their first occupation.
In the Kezar Lake region of Sutton abundant evidences of Indian occupation were found by the whites in 1767. It was stated by the early settlers there that, though no Indian was seen by them, yet it seemed as though he had just put out his fire and gone away; his track was still plain and unmistakable. On the west bank of Kezar Lake were several acres of land which appeared to have been cleared by them of their original
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HISTORY OF GOSHEN, N. H.
forests. Here were found several Indian hearths built with stone, with much ingenuity and skill; an Indian burial-place; gun- barrels and arrows and, near the pond, were found stone mortar- pestles and tomahawks .* A considerable number of Indian utensils and arms have also been found in the adjoining portion of New London, near Sunapee Lake, leading Mr. Sargent to believe that the Indians had a settlement on the border of the lake and that they had a track, or path, from this camp down by Harvey's Pond to North Sutton and thus to Kezar Lake.
The word Sunapee, made Soo-ni-pi by the late Prof. Quack- enbos, has adhered to the lake and adjacent mountain and is alleged to be an Algonquin word signifying "Goose Lake." "There is no doubt that the lake was at one time the resort of large flocks of wild geese," says Wm. C. Sturoc.
A general northward withdrawal of the Indians had been unavoidable following their defeat in King Philip's War, the dogged pressure of the whites having forced them to abandon not only their villages, but their meager fields of maize and pumpkins upon which they must rely for sustenance. But two choices were left to them, (a) alliance with the French to secure for themselves both food and military support, or (b) virtual subjugation amidst a changing environment. The majority of their numbers sullenly retreated, to join in new groupings, as that of St. Francis, whose chief characteristic was their hatred of the English.t
From this seemingly-secure fastness they raided southward at will, over a trail shown upon a map in Vol. I, State Papers, inscribed "By this trail captives have been carried to Canada." Up the valley of Otter Creek from Lake Champlain it had come, over the Green Mountain divide to the head of the Black River, following which the valley of the Connecticut is reached at a point nearly opposite the present village of Charlestown. Here the historic stockade-fort long known as Number Four was built about 1743 and was so stoutly defended by Capt. Phineas Stevens as to challenge the Indian's mastery of the region.
Wolfe's victory at Quebec, Sept. 13, 1759, broke the power of
*New London, by Sargent, in Lewis's Hist. of Merrimack Co.
+Ernest L. Sherman, "King Phillip's War," typed thesis, U. N. H. 1949.
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INDIAN DAYS
the French in America and likewise ended the menace of Indian forays. The garrison-house at Canterbury, on the summit of a steep descent in full view of Mt. Kearsarge, could relax its vigil- ance, its "great Gun" pointing emptily. It was so throughout the grouped garrison-houses of Rumford and at the Putney Hill garrison, 1744, in Hopkinton, where eyes had long looked fear- fully to the majestic panorama of the western rim from whence the Indians had been wont to come.
This peaceful condition, so profound as to be almost un- believable, was commented upon in Dec., 1770, by Samuel Cole, Esqr., of Claremont, in correspondence with the secretary of his missionary society in London. He wrote: "The Indians in Con- necticut are strangely dwindled away and to the north there is none I hear of on this side of Canada, unless four or five in Dr. Wheelock's school at Hanover (now Dartmouth College) about twenty-four miles above us." This fact has been noted by later writers .*
Mementos of this vanished race have never been reported in Goshen. Only legend is preserved, the legend of the Silver mine and a lone Indian known as "Old Doras," or Dorus - the spell- ing is phonetic; the ending gives the sound of us, with accent on the first syllable, dó-rus, and this form will be here used.
Of the silver-mine many a story has come down - of men who chanced upon it only to lose all trace of it again. Its location is very indefinite, varying with the narrator, and, furthermore, it was purported to be guarded by a headless Indian, after the accepted manner of all treasure-trove. Nothing could be better calculated to stir the imagination of youngsters, and boys of past generations were always alert for signs of the cave that might by chance conceal the silver-mine.
Its known origin dates back to the French and Indian War, when Timothy Corliss, the great-grandfather of Mrs. Orin Cross of Sunapee, was taken captive by the savages at Weare meadows
*"Since the termination of the French and Indian War, in 1760, the Indians had not troubled the settlements along the Connecticut River. Game and fish were very abundant and occasionally they resorted in small numbers to their old hunting and fishing grounds, but their visits were few and short. Probably they never occupied the territory in this vicinity as a permanent or habitual abode . Otis F. R. Waite, Hurd's Hist. of Cheshire and Sullivan Conties.
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HISTORY OF GOSHEN, N. H.
and carried to Lake Sunapee. The Indians showed him a vein of ore on the eastern slope of Sunapee Mountain from which lead was mined and made by them into bullets. Corliss was kept in captivity till after the fall of Quebec* and though he returned to Sunapee in later years and searched diligently for the mine its whereabouts eluded him.
That it was a lead mine in Sunapee tradition and silver in Goshen is easily explained, as traces of silver are commonly found in lead ores. Credence for the Goshen version is furnished by the fact that Silver Mountain in Lempster, a few miles to the south, is so-called because of an alleged outcropping of the metal.
One story told by our elders never failed to provide fascina- tion. A party of men gathered, so it went, and by good fortune successfully reached the mouth of the mine unmolested. The forest was still and apparently peaceful as they paused to take counsel. Mindful of the headless Indian, the leader suggested that to gain entrance, if he threw some personal belonging into the cave, the haunting savage could not reasonably refuse to let him in to reclaim it. The stratagem was accepted by his companions and he thereupon cast his sheath-knife as far as he could into the shadowy opening before him.
An early date for the episode is indicated by the results. It was not the headless Indian with whom they had to contend, but a party of very live savages who had been working in the mine and now rushed forth to chase the astonished whites scat- tering for their lives and evidently so terrified that they never again returned.
Waite recalls that a single Indian by the name of Tonsa still lingered for several years after arrival of white men in the vicin- ity of Claremont; he was reported to be a chieftain and was later killed in a duel with Timothy Atkins. The queston arises: was Tonsa considered by his tribe too old for the long migration northwestward to Lake Champlain, or was it a sentimental at- tachment for the scenes of his ancestors that held him? Who can say? The same questioning may also be applied to Dorus.
*Address by Albert D. Felch, Sunapee, 1918.
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INDIAN DAYS
Yet Goshen's lone Indian is of historical substance. No date can be attached to him and the manner of his life is unknown beyond the fact that he used to sit and fish from the great rock on the east shore of Rand's Pond, now designated by the Y.M.C.A Camp Soangetaha as Chapel Rock, but previously known for many generations after the Indian, "Old Dorus." True, one informant, years ago, stated Dorus lived with his son in a hut back in the woods from the great rock, but the co- existence of a son is doubtful. All recalled details indicate that Old Dorus lived alone. It was believed that he knew the loca- tion of the silver-mine and, under pressure from his greedy neighbors, was twice induced to promise that he would reveal its whereabouts. However, he artfully sidestepped the actual performance of the deed. Once he had led his man far into the mountains when, with a snort of anger, he suddenly disappeared in the thickets, leaving the white to get out as best he could. The time and manner of Dorus' death is unknown.
CHAPTER VIII
Signers of the Association Test The Trials of War
U NDER date of April 12, 1776, Meshech Weare, Chairman of the Committee of Safety of New Hampshire, forwarded to the selectmen of all the towns in the state a paper declaring loy- alty to the American Colonies, and requesting that they "desire" all males above twenty-one years of age, "excepting Lunaticks, Idiots and Negroes," to sign it, together with the names of those refusing to sign. This was known as the Association Test. Its wording follows:
"WE, the subscribers, do hereby solemnly engage, and promise, that we will, to the utmost of our Power, at the Risque of our Lives and Fortunes, with ARMS, oppose the Hostile Proceedings of the British Fleets, and Armies, against the United American COLONIES.
No attempt was made by Mr. Weare to gloss over harsh words. It was "at the risk of their lives and fortunes, with arms." Yet there was a surprising unanimity in signing. Capt. Samuel Gun- nison and Benjamin Thurber, selectmen, reported July 15, 1776, "the inhabitants of Saville . . have all Signed this Association." It was so in Lempster - all signed, among them being several later included in Goshen; Allen Willey, David Willey, a Bing- ham, the Abells, one or more, William Story and William Carey, whose widow was living in 1792. In Newport, June 20, Josiah Stevens, one of three selectmen, recorded that all had signed, Amos Hall's name appearing in the list.
So many of the Saville signers became Goshen residents that inclusion of the whole seems warranted:
Robert Woodward William mack Breney Samuel Gunnison mark Elezer x Sisco his michael Bowden John Bevens
Ephraim Bradbury Georg Walker Lear mark
Benjman x howord his Benjamin Thurber Samuel Thurber Daniel Sherburne
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SIGNERS OF THE ASSOCIATION
Joshua Gage William Lang Daniel Grendel
Wm x Sisco his benjman Rand mark
Of the Sunapee residents included above detailed accounts are given in Bartlett's "Story of Sunapee" and need not be repeated here, save for a few items concerning John Bevens. As Saville's tax-collector, many transfers of property are recorded in his name in the Cheshire County Registry. Apr. 24, 1769, he was a husbandman of Charlestown and bought two full rights in Sa- ville of Oliver Corey, Esq., viz: the rights of Lemuel Hastings and Samuel Shattuck, probably in South Sunapee. On the 22nd of Sept., 1794, Abigail Bevens and her husband were residing in Little Compton, R. I .? It is surprising how many seventy-five and one hundred acre lots were acquired by him at tax-sales, many being subsequently sold at public vendue. These occur up to December, 1780, "in ye 4th. year of American Independence," as one record states, showing the distressed economic condition of the settlers.
Ephraim Bradbury was a blacksmith in Newburyport, Mass., in 1771, but had removed to Saville, beside the Province Road, where he was certainly living Oct. 4, 1777, when Lieut. Abraham Fitts of Candia passed with his detachment en route to Sara- toga. During this period he bought of John Fisher of Salem, for the sum of five shillings, one hundred acres of land in the present town of Newbury. From this it may be assumed that he lived near the Newbury line. He was born at Salisbury, Mass., son of Rowland Bradbury, who was born at Haverhill, Mass., 1724-25. He died at Mounltonboro, N. H .* Vital Records of Salisbury, p. 282, state that Ephraim Bradbury and Molly Weare of Hampton "published intentions" Feb. 13, 1773. Greeley says, married. The first recorded town-meeting of Saville was held at "dwelling house of Ephraim Bradbury," Apr. 22, 1778.
Children:
Dolly Stevens Bradbury, b. 1774. m. Daniel Adams. She died at Sandwich, 1848.
Mehitable, b. Kensington, N. H. m. Isaac Ryand. She died at Plymouth, N. H., 1848.
*Greeley Genealogy, p. 84.
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HISTORY OF GOSHEN, N. H.
Eunice, m. Joseph Graves.
Jane, b. 1782 m. 1804, Ezekiel Merrill of Plymouth, N. H. She died 1817. Rebecca Ephraim, d. aged 8 yrs.
STATEMENT RELATIVE TO REVOLUTIONARY SERVICE
To the Hono'ble the Commite of Claims in and for the Commonwealth of Newhampshire Gentlemen this may Inform your honours of the State and Sittuation of the town of Wendell During our Late unnateral war. In the first of the war there was but fifteen families twenty two poles Laram List & training Band - And in April, 1783 - but thurty four taxable poles in the town - which have always Dun their Parts & Sum times more in the Common Cause as may appear by the following account which I took from the Peopels mouths as to Collect the actual Service the peopel of this town have Done from the officers Roles they ware under I Cannot do
years
Benja Howard in the Service
0 - 9 months
Eleazer Sisco
0 - 5 -
Samuel Gunnison Junr
0- 71/2
Joseph Lear
0- 11/2
Daniel Grindle for messers Lears
0 - 5
Daniel Woodward
0 -2
Wm Lang Junr from the begining of the war & During the war
William Sisco 0 - 10 -
william mcbritton Junr
0 - 5
wm mcbritton Junr for three years wounded & Died in the Service
3 - 0 -
Edward Young
0 - 6
Daniel Grindle for himself
0 - 5
Samuel Sisco for three years
3 - 0
the above List are of those who ware in town and Did Service for the town -
Y
Joshua Gage
0 - 8 months
Esek young
1 - 2 -
abiathar young
1 - 9 -
Neamiah woodward 1 - 2 -
thomas woodward 0 - 9 -
Joshua whitne
1 - 8 -
7 - 2 -
the above List are of those who had Just purchased Land in town & made Sum Small Improvements and then went volenters into the armey in Diferant Departments
this from your humble and faithfull Servant - Errors Excepted - Wendell october the 12th 1785 - Samll Gunnison Capt.
108
SIGNERS OF THE ASSOCIATION
STATEMENT RELATIVE TO SERVICE IN THE WAR: ADDRESSED TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY, 1786
The Petition of the Selectmen of Saville, formerly so called, but wch is now incorporated by the Name of Wendell, in behalf of themselves and the other Inhabitants of said Township, unto your Honours humbly Shews -
That the Hon'ble Treasurer of this State, hath lately Issued an Extent on Your Petitioners, for the want of their Proportion of Men, during the War, which occasioned the Greatest Surprize to Your Pet'rs, as they were con- scious, that the said Inhabitants, taken in a comparative View, have done more service During the war, than Any Town in the whole State, as they Humbly conceive they shall make to appear to any committee of this Hon'ble Court; Your Pet'rs never Received any List or Demand for their proporition from any Public Officer what ever, excepting a Letter from Colo now Gen'l Bellows to Capt Gunnison for the Names of such men as went from sd Town unlisted for Three Years or during the war with the Names of the Officers under whom they Served, on which Your Pet'rs Gunnison returned the Names of William Lang jun'r Wm McBrittain Jun'r & SI Sisco Inhabitants of said town who were then in actual Service engeged for Three Years, One of whom* was wounded in Battle & afterwards died thereof And excepting a few Old men Every man in the town has Occasion- ally served in Person on Alarms and Whenever Col'o Bellows Sent Out for them, All which they humbly hope to make appear Wherefore they Request a Committee of this Hon'ble Court may be Appointed to take the Prayer of their Petition into Consideration and to Report thereon as to Justice belongs, And Your Pet'rs as in duty Bound shall ever Pray
Samll Gunnison
moses true
Selectmen
of Wendell
Wendell January 2d 1786.
(Editor Hammond notes: The foregoing petition was referred to a com -. mittee, who reported in favor of allowing the town £60 on account of Wm. Lang, and that Wm. Sisco had been hired by the town of Croydon. The report was accepted and adopted. State Papers, Vol. 13, p. 500.)
Capt. Gunnison modestly refrained from listing his own services.
In 1775 Saville's total population numbered sixty-five, thirty- three males and twenty-nine females, with a maximum of seven- teen men, military "effectives," between the ages of sixteen and fifty. Lang, McBritton and Sischo were already in the army. The accompanying report states that they held one pound of powder and five firearms fit for use. What a pitifully inadequate defense this little settlement could have made!
Benjamin Thurber, Capt. Gunnison's Ist. Lieutenant in 1776, is believed by Editor Hammond of State Papers, Vol. 14, p. 435,
*Wm. McBritton, Jun.
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HISTORY OF GOSHEN, N. H.
to have been the man (first name omitted in report) who was appointed Adjutant of Col. David Gilman's Regiment, Dec. 5, 1776. Enlistment periods of the garrisons at Fort George and Ticonderoga were expiring on the last day of December and it was imperative that occupying forces be maintained. Subse- quent activities of Adjt. Thurber are obscure. By 1790, date of the first national census, the name had appeared in Warner .*
(Diary of Lieut. Abraham Fitts of Candia, Capt. Moses Baker's Company of Volunteers, who joined the Northern Continental Army at Saratoga, September, 1777. (S. P. Vol. 16, p. 936. Company Roll given in S. P. Vol. 13, pps. 402-03.)
"A JOURNALL."
Inlisted Saturday ye 27 of Sept. 1777.
Met and Draw'd powder tuesday ye 30 of Sept.
Marcht oct ye 2d on Thirsday to Abram Browns in hopkinton, 25 mile. Marcht from Browns on friday ye 3d of October to hoyts in amesburytown (Warner), Robies in perrytown (Sutton) 6 miles to Lanes in Fishersfield 22 miles from hopkinton meeting house. Hanika is Southerd from Lanes.
Logd at Clarks in fishersfield 5 miles from Lanes by Great Sunepy.
Marcht Saturday ye 4th from Clarks to grouts 21 mile from Clarks, thro part of Saville by E Bradburys then in Unity by Judkinst . . to grouts at No. 4.
Sabbath October ye 5th marcht from Grouts to No Joytown (?) 3 mile then over the ferry to Reeds in Rockingham in the State of Vermont 3 mile & Lodgd a Sabbath Day night."
For the sake of brevity, Lieut. Fitts' narrative must herewith be con- densed. Continuing across Vermont, on October 7, by a march of twenty miles, he arrived at "Allen's in Manchester," Gen. Stark's old headquarters. Friday morning, the 10th., his company marched to Saratoga, upon an alarm, but saw no action and returned to their lodging at "tiffsmills." For the following three days the men worked at intrenching. Tuesday, Oct. 14, Fitts announces "Sessation on Arms," or in modern phrase, an arranged truce, culminating in his quaint statement, "ye 17 Friday Mr. Burgoyne marchd off the Ground and Gen'l Gates marcht in. Then we marcht to Saratoga, put up in a Barn." Within a few days Capt. Baker's company
*The late Martin H. Huntoon of Bradford recalled an old jingle that was common in his neighborhood when he was a boy. His family lived in the first house in Unity westerly, up the hill, from the old Goshen Earl Hotel:
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