USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > Manchester > History of Manchester, formerly Derryfield, in New-Hampshire : including that of ancient Amoskeag, or the middle Merrimack Valley, together with the address, poem, and other proceedings of the centennial celebration of the incorporation of Derryfield at Manchester, October 22, 1851 > Part 9
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Hence the conclusion is inevitable that the deed of May, 17, 1629, to the Rev. John Wheelwight and others, is a genuine deed.
* Belknap's History, p. 8.
t See Hutch, Coll. Papers, p. 423.
20
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
The affairs of Laconia being less prosperous than anticipated, and the part of that patent west of the Piscataqua, having been set apart to Capt. Mason, a grant of a tract of land was made to Edward Hilton and his associates, who had settled at much cost of time and labor at Hilton's Point, now known as Dover Neck. This grant took in Dover Neck, the north part of New- ington and Greenland, the whole of Stratham, and a part of Ex- eter, up to Squamsauke Falls, carrying a breadth of three miles down the Exeter river, and the Great Bay to the Piscataqua.
This grant was made March 12, 1630.
On the 3d day of November, 1631, a grant was made, of the land south upon the Piscataqua, to Sir F. Gorges, Capt. John Mason, John Cotton, Henry Gardner, George Griffith, Edwin Gay, Thomas Wannerton, Thomas Eyre, and Eliezer Eyre. These individuals had expended three thousand pounds upon the settlement at the mouth of the river, and this grant seems to have been made to them out of the grant of Mason, on the west side of the River, and the land of Gorges on the east side, as an equivalent, in part, for their expenditures, for settling this part of the patent of Laconia. This grant included the land on which " the buildings and salt works were erected on both sides the harbor and river of Piscataqua, to the extent of five miles westward by the sea coast, then to cross over towards the other plantation in the hands of Edward Hilton."* This patent included part of the present town of Kittery in Maine, all of New Castle, Rye, and Portsmouth, and the south parts of New- ington and Greenland. These grants were made by the con- sent of all parties and for their mutual advantage. From this time the adventurers prosecuted the business of their colonies with energy.
After this division, the Patentees seem to have enlarged their views beyond the mere establishment of fishing stations, as men and women were soon sent over by Capt. Mason, and a large number of cattle and hogs, with an abundance of stores for the use of the colony. The cattle were brought from Den- mark, were large and of a yellow color, and with them came Danes to have care of them, and to manufacture potash, with which manufacture, they had become acquainted in Denmark.
With this accession of colonists, came Renald Fernald, a sur- geon and physician, whose presence was rendered necessary, by the prevalence of disease and the anticipated wants of the in- creasing colony.
* Hutch. Vol. 1, page 216.
21
MASON AND GORGES DIVIDE THEIR PROPERTY.
This speculation did not meet the expectations of the propri- etors, and Mason and Gorges soon had, by purchase, or the withdrawal of the members of the company, the entire control of the Patent, at the mouth of the Piscataqua. Mason and Gorges, in 1634, divided their property, real and personal, and Gorges relinquished to Mason his title to all lands west of the Piscataqua, and about the same time sold to him a tract of land three miles in width, east of the Piscataqua, and extending from the mouth of the same to the head of the Newichewannock river. The entire control of the Plantations upon the Piscata- qua, except that of Hilton's patent before described, thus fell into the hands of Capt. Mason, while Gorges concentrated his energies upon his colony at York and Saco.
It is highly probable that Mason intended to emigrate to New Hampshire, and this accounts for the zeal with which he pros- ecuted the enterprise, and for the fact, that he had erected the large house known as " Mason Hall," and had attached thereto, a manor of some four thousand acres of land, and stocked the same with cattle, swine, and goats, with well skilled servants for the care of the same.
22
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
CHAPTER III.
The Indians of New England .- Smith's account of them .- Narragansets .- Pe- quots .- Nipmucks .- Norridgewocks or Abnakis, under French influence .- Scootucks .- Milicetes .- Mic Macs .- Tarratines .- The Bashaba of Penobscot slain with his family .- A fatal disease, -- Meadows, or intervales of the Merri- mack,; the bottoms of ancient lakes .- Abundance of fish .- An Indian Para- dise .- The Indian dislikes leaving it .- The tribes upon the Merrimack .- Agawam .- Wamesit,-or Pawtucket .- Nashua .- Souhegan. - Amoskeag .- Pennacook .- Winnepesaukee .- Other tribes subject to Passaconnaway .- Wachusett .- Coos .- Pequaquaukes-Ossipee .- Squamscot. - Winnecowett. Piscataqua .-- Newichawonnock .--- Saco .-- Amariscoggin .-- Nipmucks. -- Abundance offish and facilities for taking them at Namaoskeag .- A royal residence .- Location of villages .- Ancient remains .- Eliot invited here by Passaconnaway .-- Thinks of establishing an Indian town here.
The voyagers to the coast of New England, in the early part of the 17th century, found the same divided among several tribes of Indians, all speaking radically the same language,- Algonkin. Capt. John Smith, of these early voyagers, gives the most minute account of these tribes. He says, " The prin- cipall habitations I saw at Northward, was Pennobscot, who are in Warres with the Terentines, their next Northerly neighbors. Southerly up the Rivers, and along the Coast, wee found Mec- adacut, Segocket, Pemmaquid, Nusconcus, Sagadahock, Sat- quin, Aumughcawgen, and Kenabeca: to those belong the Countries and people of Segotago, Pauhuntanuck, Pocopassum, Taughtanakagnet, Wabigganus, Nassaque, Mauherosqueck, Wa- rigwick, Moshoquen, Waccogo, Pasharanack, &c. To those are alied in confederacy the Countries of Aucocisco, Accomin- ticus, Passataquak, Augawoam and Naemkeck, all those for any thing I could perceive, differ little in language or any thing, though most of them be Sagamos and Lords of themselves, yet they hold the Bashabes of Pennobscot the chiefe and great- est amongst them. The next is Mattahunt, Totant, Massachu- set, Paconekick, then Cape Cod, by which is Pawmet, the Iles Nawset and Capawuck, neere which are the shoules of Rocks and sands that stretch themselves into the maine Sea twenty leagues, and very dangerous, betwixt the degrees of 40 and 41."*
Most of these tribes, named by Smith, occupied the same
* See Mass. Hist. Coll. Vol. iii, third series, p. 20.
23
THE INDIANS OF NEW ENGLAND.
relative positions for more than a century, after the country was permanently settled by the English.
West of Cape Cod were the powerful tribes of the Narra- gansets* and Pequots ; while in the country, upon the rivers and lakes, were several powerful tribes ; the Nipmucks, in the inte- rior of Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, and occupying the valley of the Merrimack, in New Hampshire, and Massachu- setts ; and the Norridgewocks seated upon the branches of the Kennebec, and the Lakes in the northern interior of Maine. This last tribe was called Abnakis by the French, and was prin- cipally noted for their adherence to the French interests, and their inroads upon the French settlements, which their connec- tion with the French, led them to undertake.
East of the Penobscot, were the Scootucks, or Passama- quoddies, inhabiting the Scootuck or St. Croix river and the shore of Passamaquoddy Bay ; the Milicetes in the valley of the river St. John; and the Micmacs, occupying the rest of New Brunswick, and the peninsula of Nova Scotia.
The Micmacs were, and still are, a warlike people. Living mainly upon the sea shore, athletic, of powerful frame, and most expert canoe-men, they were fond of warlike expeditions, and often were a source of fear and anxiety to their western neighbors, under the dreaded name of Tarratines. They even extended their war expeditions against the tribes of Massachu- setts, within the knowledge of the English, and in some of the earliest stipulations between the tribes of New Hampshire and Massachusetts, and their English neighbors, mention is made of their dread of the Tarratines.
When Capt. Smith coasted along the shore of New England, in 1614, making the island of Monheagan the centre of his op- erations, the Penobscot tribe was one of the most powerful in New England. They were under the control of a Bashaba or Chief, who held the tribes of Maine as far west as the Saco, as tributary, or subject to him. He was then at war with the Tar- ratines, and in 1615, that warlike people sent an expedition against him, with such secrecy and consequent success, as that they took him by surprise, and put him and his family to death.
Divisions arose as to the succession to the Bashaba, of which the Tarratines taking the advantage, soon overpower- ed the other tribes of Maine, and extended a war of extermina-
* Varraganset is from Nanrantsouack and means a carrying-place. Norridge- wock is also a corruption of the same word. (Sec Mem. Amer. Acad. New Se- ries, Vol. I. pages 372 and 373.)
24
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
tion along the coast of Massachusetts. Hand in hand, as it were, with war, stalked pestilence, so that in 1620, the tribes upon the sea coast, from the St. Croix to Cape Cod, had be- come greatly depreciated in numbers ; and some places had be- come almost entirely depopulated.
Speaking of this depopulation, Capt. Smith says, " they had three plagues in three years successively neere two hundred miles along the Sea coast, that in some places there, scarce remained five of a hundred" * *** " but it is most certaine there was an exceeding great plague amongst them ; for where I have seene two or three hundred, within three years after re- mained scarce thirty."
Whatever this disease may have been, it seems to have ex- tended little farther south than Cape Cod, and to have been limited in violence, at least, among the tribes of the interior, so that the Pilgrims in 1620, and for many years subsequent, had but little to fear from the once powerful tribes upon the seashore north of Cape Cod ; but on the contrary, had to use every precaution, and much vigilance against the power of the southern tribes, and those of the interior, which had been less afflicted by disease and war.
At this period, the most powerful tribes of the interior, and probably of New England, north of the Pequots, had their resi- dence in the valley of the Merrimack, upon the productive falls, and fertile meadows of that beautiful river. These meadows, or " Intervales," as they are usually called, are basins made up of alluvial and vegetable deposits, and were, doubtless once covered with water, which has gradually passed away through the Merrimack, that continually deepening its channel, has burst the rocky barriers of these Bays, or Lakes, and left their former beds, dry and arable land. That these Intervales were submerged, and at a comparatively late period, hardly admits of a doubt, as the barriers of these ancient bays can be readily traced above Pawtucket, Amoskeag, Hookset, Garvin's and Sewall's falls ; and upon most of these basins, or intervales, have been found far below their surface, logs, fresh-water shells, and other unmistakable evidences of submersion.
The Merrimack then, was a succession of Bays, from Lake Winnepesaukee to the ocean, a part of which now remain at Sanbornton and Meredith, and which add so much of beauty to the scenery of that neighborhood.
These intervales were of very great fertility, and' of such ready productiveness, as to afford an abundant harvest to the
25
THE INDIANS OF THE MERRIMACK VALLEY.
scanty husbandry of the Indian. More than two centuries of culture, have hardly decreased their fertility.
Then the Merrimack afforded other superior advantages for Indian settlements. Rising in the White Mountains, at an al- titude of six thousand feet above the level of the ocean, its wa- ters find their way to the Atlantic, through the distance of two hundred and fifty miles ; of course there are rapids and falls, through most of its entire length. These afforded the most ample fishing grounds to the natives, whereat to spear, and take with dip-net, and seine, the myriads of alewives, shad, and salmon, that, literally crowded the Merrimack, during certain seasons of the year. Then the woods upon its banks were filled with moose, deer, and bears,-whilst the ponds and lakes, the sources of its tributaries, were teeming with water fowl.
In this beautiful " Valley of the Merrimack," with all these attractions of fertile planting grounds, an abundance of fish, and hunting grounds of unlimited extent,-the first English adven- turers found several tribes of Indians, occupying localities, cho- sen with Indian taste and with special reference to his comfort and his wants. From its mouth far above its affluents, the Winnepesaukee and Pemegewasset, the shores of this " Sil- ver Stream," were dotted with Indian villages.
It was the very paradise of the Indian imagination. Is it a wonder that the wresting of such a home from "the lords of the soil," should have been accompanied with strife and bloodshed ? That the Indian in his ignorance and wildness, when driven from the graves of his fathers, at the hands of strangers, should have left the marks of his vengeance behind him, traced with all the horrors of the scalping-knife and toma- hawk? It is not strange ; nor is it so singular, or so much a matter of reproach, as that a people, fresh from the lash of op- pression, laying claim to much of humanity, and ever bearing upon their arm the shield of morality and religion,-should have driven the simple hearted natives from their lands without even color of right, except what comes from that precept of barbarism, that, might makes right; without even color of title, when title was pretended, except what was purchased for a few blankets, a trucking coat, a few beads and baubles ;- or, perhaps still worse,-for a runlet of " occupee," or " fire-wa- ter !"
These tribes upon the Merrimack were the Agawam, Wamesit, or Pawtucket, Nashua, Souhegan, Namaoskeag, Pen- nacook, and Winnepesaukee. The Agawam tribe occupied the eastern part of what is now Essex county in Massachusetts,
26
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
extending from tide-water upon the Merrimack, round to Cape Ann. Their territory, skirted upon two sides by the Merrimack and Atlantic, indented by bays, intersected by rivers, and inter- spersed with ponds, was appropriately called Wonnesquamsauke, meaning literally, the Pleasant Water Place, the word being a compound from Wonne, (pleasant, ) Asquam, (water, ) and Auke, (a place.) This word was sometimes contracted to Wonne- squam, often to Squamsauke, and still oftener to Squam, or Asquam.
The deep guttural pronunciation of asquam by the Indians, sounded to the English like agawam and hence the word as applied to the Indians of that locality. Several localities in Essex county, are now known by names contracted and deriv- ed from this Indian word Wonnesquamsauke ; as " Squam" the name of a pleasant harbor and village upon the north side of Cape Ann, and " Swamscot," the name of a pleasant village in the eastern part of Lynn.
The Wamesits lived at the forks of the Merrimack and Con- cord rivers, and upon both sides of the latter river.
Wamesit, is derived from Wame (all or whole) and Auke (a place) with the letter s thrown in betwixt the two syllables for the sake of the sound. The Indian village at this place, un- doubtedly received this name from the fact that it was a large village, the place where all the Indians collected together. This was literally true in the spring and summer, as the Pawtucket falls, near by, were one of the most noted fishing places in New England, where the Indians from far and near, gathered togeth- er in April and May, to catch and dry their year's stock of shad and salmon. Wamesit was embraced nearly in the present lim- its of the city of Lowell, in Middlesex county, Massachu- setts.
The Indians in this neighborhood were sometimes called Pawtuckets, from the falls in the Merrimack, of that name. Pawtucket, means the forks, being derived from the Indian word Pohchatuk (a branch.) Pawtucket seems, however, to have been applied by the English, rather to all the Indians north of the Merrimack, than to the particular tribe at the falls of that name.
The Nashuas occupied the lands upon the Nashua and the intervales upon the Merrimack, opposite and below the mouth of that river. Nashua means the river with a pebbly bottom- a name said to have been peculiarly appropriate, before art had deprived it of this distinctive beauty.
The Souhegans lived upon the Souhegan river, occupying
27
THE INDIANS OF THE MERRIMACK VALLEY.
the rich intervales upon both banks of the Merrimack, above and below the mouth of the Souhegan. Souhegan is a con- traction of Souheganash, an Indian noun in the plural number, meaning worn-out lands. These Indians were often called Natacooks or Nacooks, from their occupying ground that was free from trees, or cleared land-Netecook meaning a clearing.
The Namaoskeags resided at the falls in the Merrimack, known at present by the name of Amoskeag, in Manchester. This word written variously, Namaske, Namaoskeag, Naum- keag, and Naimkeak, means the fishing place, from Namaos (a fish) and Auke (a place.)
The Pennacooks occupied the rich intervales at Pennacook, now embraced in the towns of Bow, Concord and Boscawen, in the county of Merrimack. They were thus called, from Pennaqui, (crooked) and Auke, (place,) the intervales at Con- cord, which are extensive, being embraced within the folds of the Merrimack, which winds its way along, in a very crook- ed manner .*
The Winnepesaukies occupied the lands in the vicinity of the Lake of that name, one of their noted fishing places be- ing at the outlet of the Winnepesaukee, now known as the Weirs, the parts of permanent Indian weirs having remained at that place long after the advent of the whites. Winnepesaukee is derived from Winne (beautiful) nipe (water) kees (high) and Auke (a place, ) meaning literally, the beautiful water of the high place.
Of these several tribes, the Pennacooks were the most pow- erful ; and either from their superiority, arising from a long res- idence upon a fertile soil, and hence more civilized ; or from having been for a long period under the rule of a wise Chief,- and perhaps from both causes united,-had become the head, as it were, of a powerful confederacy.
It is well known that the Winnepesaukee, Amoskeag, Souhe- gan, and Nashua tribes, were completely subservient to the Pen- nacooks ; while the Wamesits were so intermarried with them, as to be mainly under their control, acknowledged fealty to Pas- saconaway, and finally, with the other tribes upon the Merri- mack, became merged with the Pennacooks, and ceased to be distinct tribes, in fact or name.
The Agawams, were also intimately connected with the Pen- nacooks, and acknowledged fealty to them, and doubtless were
* It may be that Pennacook means the ground-nut place, in which case it would be derived from Penak, (a ground-nut,) and Auke, (a place.)
28
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
one of the earliest tribes to become merged with them; but still they ceased to exist as a distinct tribe, at so early a date, that few particulars of their history have been preserved.
Besides the tribes in the valley of the Merrimack, the Pen- nacooks had control over the most of the tribes from the Con- cord river, in Massachusetts, to the sources of the Connecticut, and from the highlands betwixt the Merrimack and Connecticut, to the Kennebec in Maine. It is known that the Wachusetts, from Wadchu, (a mountain ) and Auke, (a place, ) near Wachusett mountain in Massachusetts ; the Coosucks, from Cooash (pines,) upon the sources of the Connecticut river ; the Pequaquaukes from Pequaquis (crooked) and Auke (a place) upon the sources of the Saco, in Carroll county, in New Hampshire, and Oxford county in Maine ; the Ossipees from Cooash (pines) and Sipe (a river,) upon the Ossipee lake and river in Carroll county, in New Hampshire, and York County in Maine ; the Squamscotts, from Winne, (beautiful) Asquam, (water) and Auke, (a place,) upon Exeter river, in Exeter and Stratham, in Rockingham county ; the Winnecowetts, from Winne (beautiful,) Cooash, (pines,) and Auke (a place) in the Hamptons in the same county ; the Piscataquaukes, from Pos, (great,) Attuck, (a deer,) and Auke, (a place,) up- on the Piscataqua river, the boundary betwixt New Hamp- shire and Maine; the Newichewannocks, from Nee (my,) Week (a contraction of weekwam, a house) and Owannock, (come, )-upon one of the upper branches of the same river ; the Sacos, from Sawa (burnt,) Coo, (pine, ) and Auke, (a place,) upon the Saco river, in York county, Maine ; and the Amaris- coggins, from Namaos, (fish,) kees, (high,) and Auke, (a place) upon the Amariscoggin river, having its source in New Hamp- shire and emptying its waters into the Kennebec,-all ac- knowledged the power and control of the Pennacooks, and were members of the confederacy of which that powerful tribe was the head, and Passaconnaway, the leading Sagamon or Bash- aba.
These Indians from the interior, were known and called among the tribes upon the sea shore, by the general name of Nipmucks-or Fresh Water Indians. Nipmuck, is derived from Nipe, (still water) and Aukce (a place,) with the letter m thrown in for the sake of the euphony. And true to their name, the Nipmucks usually had their residences upon places of still wa- ter, the ponds, lakes and sivers of the interior.
But the Indians in the Merrimack valley, although properly Nipmucks, and living in distinct bands or tribes, were usually call-
29
FISHERIES AT NAMAOSKEAG FALLS.
ed by the English, Pennacooks, from the fact that the tribe at Pen- nacook was the most powerful one in the valley, and under the rule of Passaconnaway, had become, as has already been seen, the head of a powerful confederacy. This position of that tribe, brought its people in contact with the English on all oc- casions of moment, such as conferences and negotiations, and hence the English, meeting on such occasions Pennacooks al- most exclusively, applied the name of Pennacook to the tribes generally inhabiting the upper Merrimack valley. And in course of time, as the Indians became reduced in numbers by emigration, war, and contact with civilization, the smaller tribes became united with the larger ones, till in 1685, the Penna- cooks were the only tribe in, and had exclusive possession of, the Merrimack valley.
The Merrimack naturally, was but a series of falls, rapids, and ripples, from the Souhegan to the lower Pennacook falls, (now Garvin's.) These afforded the most ample opportunity for fishing, and the name of Namaoskeag, was doubtless appli- ed to that section of the river and the adjacent country around ; but in course of time, as fish became more limited, the name of Namaoskeag, became to be applied to the immediate neighbor- hood of the principal falls, now known as Amoskeag.
The fish at these falls were most abundant, and the facilities for taking them, superior to those of any other place upon the. Merrimack.
The river below the main fall, in the course of a few miles, is entered by a number of rivers and rivulets, having their sourc- es in lakes at no great distance ; and of course, at certain sea -. sons, it was filled with alewives, waiting an opportunity to pass up those small streams ; thus both in the Merrimack, and in those streams, affording ready opportunity to take them in any quantity.
Then at the same season, the great basin or Eddy, at the foot of Merrill's falls, and at the mouth of the Piscataquog river, was literally filled with eels, shad, and salmon, waiting a pas- sage up the falls, occupied by their earlier or more expert com- panions ; over and among which, the Indian in his canoe, could pass, and spear or net, at will.
Again, at the foot of the main fall, and upon the western bank of the river, here dividing, and passing among, and around certain small islands, was, and is at the present time, a basin or eddy, emptied by a small passage, easily rendered im- passable for fish, by a weir, and ever filled with fish, in the season of them, from the falls above, the force of the water
7
30
THE HISTORY OF MANCHESTER.
rushing over the main pitch of the falls, naturally and inevita- bly driving into this pool, those fish, that in the rush, did not succeed in passing up the falls. Here they were as secure as in an eel pot, and the Indians could take them at their conven- ience.
Then, at the main falls, and at the islands below. the river passes amid rocks in narrow channels, and upon these rocks and channels, the Indian could stand through day and night, if he chose, and throw spear and dip-net, without missing a fish, or fishes, at each " throw." And last, the various fish did not usu- ally arrive at these falls, until after the twentieth of May, when the planting season was over, thus affording the Indians plenty of time to take and cure them, without interruption, from their ag- ricultural pursuits, however scanty. Whereas at Pawtucket, and the rapids in that neighborhood, the fish arrived usually about the first of May and continued through the busiest time of corn- planting.
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