USA > New Hampshire > Grafton County > Plymouth > History of Plymouth, New Hampshire; vol. I. Narrative--vol. II. Genealogies, Volume I > Part 2
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Advised & consented That a Warrant be made out to the Treasurer to pay the above sum of Twenty pounds to the sd Lieut: Baker for himself & company accordingly
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
Penhallow's Indian Wars, printed 1726, while in error concern- ing the route pursued by Lieutenant Baker, briefly states the incidents of the expedition in the record of the spring of 1712.
About this time fifty of our English who went up Merrimack river returned with the good account of eight Indians that they had slain and of considerable plunder besides, which they had taken, without the loss of one man.
There are many later narratives of Baker's fight with the Indians in Plymouth. Two of these are original statements and are quoted. The others contain no added information, and even the original statements, written many years after the events, are not authenticated by contemporaneous record. In the first state- ment, which is found in Farmer and Moore's Collections, Vol. III, the date should be 1712.
About the year 1720, Capt. Thomas Baker of Northampton, in the county of Hampshire, in Massachusetts, sat off with a scouting party of thirty-four men, passed up Connecticut river and crossed the height of land to Pemigewasset river. He there discovered a party of Indians, whose Sachem was called Walternummus, whom he attacked and de- stroyed. Baker and the Sachem levelled and discharged their guns at each other at the same instant. The ball from the Indian's gun grazed Baker's left eyebrow, but did him no injury. The ball from Baker's gun went through the breast of the Sachem. Immediately upon being wounded, he leaped four or five feet high, and then fell instantly dead. The Indians fled to the river ; Baker and his party pursued and destroyed every one of them. They had a wigwam on the bank of the river, which was nearly filled with beaver. Baker's party took as much of it, as they could carry away, and burned the rest. Baker lost none of his men in this skirmish. It took place at the confluence of a small river with the Pemigewasset, between Plymouth and Campton, which has since had the name of Baker's river.
The account given by Mrs. Bean, a daughter of Captain Baker, confirms the story of an engagement with the Indians but presents a different picture of the battle: -
She said that the enemy was composed of a large body of French and Indians, who were coming down from Canada to kill and destroy the
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CAPTAIN BAKER.
English ; that they were in their boats sailing down the River : that, Baker, having previously discovered them, secreted his men in ambush, on the banks of the river, and at a signal given, his men fired upon them in their birch canoes, killed and wounded so many, sank their boats and so disconcerted them, that the remainder made a precipitate retreat to Canada. Capt. Baker was well acquainted with their chief, " Water- nomee," who was richly attired, his blanket covered with silver broockes, his powder horn and all his various trinkets, Capt. Baker took, and they are still among his descendants. Long afterwards, he used to show them to the Indians; they would shed tears, and make gestures, as though they would some time kill him, when war once more arose.
Traditional narratives expand by repetition. The accounts of the engagement with the Indians which have been quoted are dressed in the familiar uniform, and wear the service stripes of frequent use. The two accounts are contradictory in substance and in detail, but are constructed on familiar models. The duel between the captain of the soldiers and the chief of the Indians has embellished the narrative of many engagements in the Indian wars. In every instance the soldier is grazed but unharmed, and the poor Indian, pierced by a bullet, leaps to a stated altitude and expires. It is remarkable that these historic bullets, leaping from muzzle pointing to muzzle, and traversing in opposite direc- tion the same course, have not met midway, smiting each other to the earth, much to the dismay of the opposing marksmen. In honor of Captain Baker one is sorry that Walternummus leaped only four or five feet high. Paugus, when shot by Chamberlain, leaped six feet high and died in the air.
Adhering closely to original record and admitting only the evidence of contemporaneous statement, it is authentic history that Captain Baker and his men fell upon and dispersed a body of Indians. The battle-field was at the northern extremity of Plymouth village. Several Indians were slain, and one Indian scalp was taken and exhibited in Boston. Penhallow, who wrote contemporaneously, states that eight Indians were slain. For- tunately the advent of a body of white men to the soil of Plymouth was not sealed with their blood.
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
Whether Captain Baker continued his march from the field of battle in triumph or retreat is not known. It is probable that he was not pursued by a crippled foe and that his march was enlivened by songs of victory. The story of retreat and the sagacity of a friendly Indian, found in Power's History of Coos, was first printed in Farmer and Moore's Historical Collections. Both narratives are the victims of internal infirmity.
Capt. Thomas Baker, the hero of the fight with the Indians in Plymouth and whose fame is perpetuated in the name of a beautiful river and a fertile intervale, was born in Northampton, Mass., May 14, 1682. He was a son of Timothy Baker and a grandson of Edward Baker. His mother was a daughter of John Holliston of Weathersfield, Conn. During the Deerfield fight in 1704 he was captured by the Indians and conducted to Canada. He escaped the following year and returned to his home in North- ampton. In the journeys and during his captivity he suffered extreme hardship and privation, but it is probable he gained con- siderable knowledge of the courses of the rivers and of the country between his home and Canada. At the time of the expedition to New Hampshire he was a lieutenant and was subsequently pro- moted to captain. During the years of nominal peace which suc- ceeded the treaty of Utrecht Col. John Stoddard and Rev. John Williams were sent by the government to Canada to conduct the prisoners there confined to their several homes. Capt. Thomas Baker was employed by the commissioners as a guide and an assistant. The narrative of the journey and the successes and failures of the negotiations is found in Stoddard's Journal printed in Vol. V New England Historical and Genealogical Register. In the course of this visit to Canada Captain Baker met the lady who became the companion of his life.
Margaret Otis, daughter of Richard and Grizzel (Warren) Otis, was born in Dover, March, 1688-89. In the attack by the Indians on the Waldron, Otis, and Heard garrisons at Dover in 1689, Maj. Richard Waldron, Richard Otis, and twenty or more others were slain. At the same time Mrs. Otis and her infant
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CAPTAIN BAKER.
daughter were led into captivity. The French priests in Canada took the child, gave her the name Christine and educated her in the Romish religion. Subsequently she married a Canadian named LeBeau, by whom she had three children.
LeBeau died before 1714, and the widow of New England par- entage was conducted by the commissioners to Massachusetts. On his return from Canada Capt. Thomas Baker settled in Brook- field, Mass. That the good people of Brookfield upheld the gal- lant captain in his wooing is confirmed by an entry in the Land Records, " then granted to Margaret Otis, alias LeBeau, one that was a prisoner in Canada and lately come from thence, forty acres of upland in Brookfield and twenty acres of meadow, provided she returns not again to live in Canada but tarries in this Prov- ince or territory and marries to Capt. Thomas Baker."
For land or for love she married him. The ceremony was solemnized at Northampton, 1715. A few years later Mrs. Baker received an argumentative letter from a Romish priest in Canada entreating her not to forsake the religion of her childhood and youth. The letter was read by others, who were of an opinion that the argument of the letter against the Protestant religion should be answered. Governor Burnet wrote a masterly reply, and the two letters were printed, 1729, and are reprinted in Vol. VIII, Collections New Hampshire Historical Society. Captain Baker was a prominent citizen of Brookfield and a Rep- resentative in 1719. Subsequently Joseph Jennings was elected. What Captain Baker said when another man was elected in his stead is not revealed, but when Joseph Jennings was appointed a Justice of the Peace Captain Baker was arraigned before the court at Springfield for blasphemy. It was alleged "there being a discource of God's having in His Providence put in Joseph Jennings Esq of Brookfield a Justice of the Peace " and Captain Baker said, "If I had been with the Almighty I would have taught him better." The jury returned a verdict of not guilty.
In 1721 and again in 1722 Captain Baker was sent by the government to Canada as a bearer of dispatches. In one of these
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
journeys his wife accompanied him and made a fruitless effort to obtain her children. Having sold their land in Brookfield, they removed, 1732, to Mendon, Mass., and two or three years later to Dover. Mrs. Baker was admitted to the church in Dover by letters from the church in Mendon, May 11, 1735. Captain Baker died soon after their removal to New Hampshire. Mrs. Baker died in Dover, Feb. 23, 1773. Capt. Thomas and Chris- tine Baker had seven children. Among these was Otis Baker of Dover, prominent in eivil and military affairs during the Revolu- tion and succeeding years. The daughter, Mary, whose statement has been quoted, married Capt. Benjamin Bean, and died in Con- way, Feb. 6, 1826, ten days less than one hundred years of age.
For generations the good people of Plymouth have regretted, and their generous sentiments of hospitality have been wounded, that Captain Baker and his men did not receive a more cordial welcome to the green fields of Plymouth. It was the first visit of white men to this beautiful valley, but they were not invited to tarry and to enjoy in a season of rest the charming scenery of verdant intervales and overhanging mountains. No banquet of venison and salmon was spread for them on the green banks of the river or the shaded slopes of the hillside. The advent of the white men and the meeting of the Indian hosts with their guests should have been a picture of peace and brotherly love, inviting the genius of the painter and inspiring the fancy of the poet. The meeting was neither an expression of peace nor an inspira- tion of art. The native lords of the Pemigewasset and Captain Baker's men met with the clash of arms and the clamor of war. The canvas is colorless and the verse is unsung.
The incidents of this expedition to the valley of the Pemige- wasset and the encounter with the Indians temporarily cooled the ardor for the exploration of this section of the country. For a decade the locality has no place on the map of events. During the three years of war with the Indians, 1722-25, commonly called Lovewell's War, several scouting parties in search of the enemy followed the Merrimack River into the interior of New
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CAPTAIN BAKER.
Hampshire. From the available narratives and journals of the expeditions commanded by Capts. Jabez Fairbanks, John White, and Samuel Willard of Lancaster, Mass., and by Capt. John Lovewell and Col. Eleazer Tyng of Dunstable, it is known that some of the companies followed the Pemigewasset as far as the ingress of Baker's River. One of these scouting parties, travel- ling in an opposite direction, followed the entire line of Captain Baker's march through New Hampshire.
The following entries in the journal of Capt. John White of Lancaster, Mass., describe his march from a point in the present town of Concord to the Connecticut River : -
13 day [April 13] we traveled 7 milds and then campt at the iarish fort in penekook Entervals, that day it rained very hard all day.
14 day we traveld 10 milds and then Crost meremack river above the mouth of Contookook river and then Campt.
15 day we traveld 8 milds north west from Contockock to a litel streamn that runs into meremack River about 3 milds westard from meremack and then campt and sent out skouts.
16 day we traveld 12 milds and Cam to a pond which was very Long and we turned to the east sid of it and then campt, and then sent out skouts, that day we lay about 3 milds westard of the mouth of Winepisoecket.
17 day it raynd vere hard the fore part of the day and a litel before niglit it cleared up & we sent skouts found northen
18 day we traveled 14 milds and that day we Crost 2 great streames that runs in to meremack, one of them comes out of a great pond which sum indens says it is 3 days jurney round it the Land is verey full of great hils and mountains and verey rockey abundance of sprus and hem- lock and fur and sum bech and maple and we campt
19 day we traveld 11 milds and then campt at the Louar End of pemichewashet Lour Entervals and sent out skouts.
20 day we lay stil by reson of foull wether and towards nit it Cleard up and we sent out skouts and found whear Cornol Tyng crost meremack.
21 day we traveld 12 milds up pemichewashet River and found old sines of indens and we sent out skouts that night and found one new track and we lay that night by the river and mad new camps. The Land that lys by this river is vere rich and good the upland vere full of hils and mountains, very bad traveling
22 day we traveld 2 milds and then sent out skouts over the river and up a stream that runs into the river but found northen
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTHI.
23 day we traveld up the river about 14 milds and that day we Crost 3 streames that runs into the river this river coms sheafly from the north west & then we campt
24 day we traveld 10 milds westward and that day we found old signs of indens whear they had bin this spring and in the winter, and sent out skouts but cold find now indens This day Samil Moosman actidently kild himself with his own gun
25 day it rained very hard and we lay stil that day til almost night it cleard up and we sent out skouts but found northen
26 day we traveld 18 milds and came upon Conetecut river and one of our men was taken vere sik that night we campt by the river
27 day we traveld down the river and found a bark cannow which was of great sarvis to our sik man & to us; that day we traveld about 18 milds and then campt.
Captain White arrived in Lancaster, Mass., May 6, 1725. In his report to the governor he makes the following reference to the march in this vieinity : -
I marched up Merrimack about one hundred and thirty miles, and there discovered some signs of Indians. Some old, which we judged were made sometimes this winter ; and one new track on the bank of the river, and we judged had gone but a few days before. I sent out scouts, but could discover nothing further. We then turned off to north- ward, toward Coos. Marched ten miles the twenty-fourth of April. At evening one of the men, viz. Sam. Mossman, of Sudbury, being about encamping, took hold of his gun that stood among some bushes, drew it towards him with the muzzle towards him. Some twigs caught hold of the cock. The gun went off and shot him through. He died immedi- ately. We went across to Connecticut river ; came down that to North- field, and from there across the woods to Lancaster.
For many years the slumber of Plymouth in the wilderness was unbroken. The French and Indian War delayed the explora- tion and settlement of new territory. The troops sent to Crown Point from year to year followed the military road through Charlestown. The earliest attempts to explore the Coos country and to establish forts and settlements were made by way of the Connectieut River. It had become known that the Merrimack River and its western tributaries led the explorer, at several
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CAPTAIN BAKER.
points, to the watershed not many miles from the Connecticut. The people living in the valley of the Merrimack desired a northern and more direct line of travel to Coos. Partly in answer to such desire and partly as a military measure in a time of war, the government of New Hampshire appointed com- missioners or a committee to survey and make a road to Coos. The word "make " when applied to roads at this date was used in the sense of locate or mark.
The committee consisted of Zaccheus Lovewell of Dunstable, John Tolford of Chester, and Caleb Page then of Derryfield and later of Dunbarton. For a guide they employed John Stark, who recently had been captured by the Indians in Rumney and had knowledge of the country. Having hired fifteen men, they set out from Concord March 10, 1753. In seven days they reached the Connecticut River at Piermont, and commenced their home- ward journey the following day, arriving in Concord March 23. From the heights in Warren they pursued the shortest course to the Connecticut.
The following year the government ordered another expedition to the Coos country. It was commanded by Capt. Peter Powers of Hollis. He proceeded as far north as Lancaster or North- umberland. The journal of the expedition is found in Rev. Grant Powers' History of the Coos Country. The part of the journal describing the march from Concord to Rumney is as follows : -
Saturday, June 15th, 1754. This day left Rumford, (now Con- cord) and marched to Contoocook, which is about eight miles, and here tarried all night.
Sunday, June 16th. This day tarried at Contoocook, and went to meeting, and tarried here all this night.
Monday, June 17th. This morning fair weather, and we fixed our packs, and went and put them on board our canoes, about nine of the clock, and some of the men went in the canoes, and the rest on the shore. And so we marched up the River Merrimack to the crotch, or parting thereof; and then up the Pemigewasset about one mile and a half, and camped above the carrying-place, which carrying-place is
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
about one hundred rods long ; and the whole of this day's march is thirteen miles.
Tuesday, June 18th. This day marched up the Pemigewasset River, about eight miles, to Smith's River, and then east one hundred rods, and then north two hundred and twenty rods to the long carying-place on Pemigewasset River, and there camped.
Wednesday, June 19th. We marched on our journey, and carried across the long carrying-place on Pemigewasset River two miles north- east, which land hath a good soil, beech and mnaple, with a good quantity of large masts. From the place where we put in the canoes, we steered east, north-east, up the river about one mile, and then we steered north east one mile and north six miles up to Sawheganet Falls, where we carried by about four rods ; and from the falls we steered about north- east, to Pemigewasset interval, two miles, and from the biginning of the interval we made good our course north four miles, and there camped on a narrow point of land. The last four miles the river was extremely crooked.
Thursday, June 20th. We steered our course, one turn with another, which were great turns, west, north-west, about two miles and a half, to the crotch, or parting of the Pemigewasset River, at Baker's River mouth ; thence from the mouth of Baker's River, up said river, north-west by west, six miles. This river is extrordinary crooked, and good interval. Thence up the river about two miles north-west, and there we shot a moose, the sun about a half an hour high, and there camped.
Scarcely had Captain Powers returned from Coos before the war was renewed with increasing vigor and severity. The laud- able effort of Gov. Benning Wentworth to explore and settle the northern section of New Hampshire was suddenly suspended and for a few years delayed. The war ended in victory and the con- quest of Canada. A story of peace and the planting of a town in the wilderness will be the substance of another chapter.
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THE CHARTER AND DRAFT OF LOTS.
III. THE CHARTER AND DRAFT OF LOTS.
THERE are several copies of the Charter of Plymouth avail- able to the students of the early history of the town. With a varied use of capital letters and very slight differences in orthog- raphy the copies are identical. The original charter issued by the governor to the grantees is a printed form, then in general use, with blank spaces for the insertion of a name, the boundaries of the town, the names of grantees, and the date of the charter. The blank spaces for insertion of the dates of town fairs were not filled. Appended to the original charter of Plymouth were the names of sixty-two grantees, and on the back is engrossed the res- ervation of the governor's farm, considered as two rights and four public rights. The original charter is in a good state of preser- vation and is now in the custody of the town library. The charter is dated July 15, 1763, and the same day was recorded at Ports- mouth in the official records of charters. These records are in the State archives at Concord. They were carried away by Gov. John Wentworth, but were returned a few years later. While these records were missing the State government ordered' a new record made of the original charters in possession of the towns. Under this requirement the charter of Plymouth was recorded by the State, Feb. 14, 1781. Another copy of the orig- inal charter, in the handwriting of Abel Webster, is found in' the Book of Records of the Proprietors in the office of the town clerk.
The grantees of Alexandria and New Chester and the other Masonian towns obtained only a grant of land. That was all the Masonian proprietors could bestow, and hence this class of towns obtained a name and the powers and privileges of a town by a VOL. I .- 2
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTHI.
subsequent act of incorporation. The charter of Plymouth and other charters issued by the governor of the province were grants of land and town privileges combined, to which was added the gift of a name, in which the grantees had no voice.
Province of New Hampshire.
GEORGE, THE THIRD,
Plymouth
Scal
By the Grace of God, of Great-Britain France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith &c.
To all persons to whom these Presents shall come, Greeting.
Know ye, that We of Our special Grace, certain Knowledge and meer Motion, for the due Encouragement of settling a New Plantation within our said Province, by and with the Advice of our Trusty and Well- beloved BENNING WENTWORTH, Esq ; Our Governor and Commander in Chief of Our said Province of NEW HAMPSHIRE in New England, and of our COUNCIL of the said Province ; HAVE upon the Conditions and Reser- vations herein after made, given and granted, and by the Presents, for us, our Heirs, and Successors, do give and grant in equal Shares unto Our loving Subjects, Inhabitants of Our said Province of NEW HAMP- SHIRE, and Our other Governments, and to their Heirs and Assigns forever, whose names are entred on this Grant, to be divided to and amongst them into Sixty Eight equal Shares, all that Tract or Parcel of Land, situate, lying and being within our said Province of NEW HAMP- SHIRE, containing by admeasurement Seventeen thousand ACRES, which Tract is to contain five & An Half Miles square, and no more; out of which an Allowance is to be made for High Ways and unimprovable Lands by Rocks, Ponds, Mountains and Rivers, One Thousand and Forty Acres free, according to a Plan and Survey thereof, made by Our said Governor's Order, and returned into the Secretary's Office, and here unto annexed, butted and bounded as follows; Viz. Begining on ye Westerly Side of Pemidgwaset River opposite to the North West Corner of Holderness where the Line of Campton comes to the Said River; from thence Westerly about Three Miles, by the South Line of Campton to the South West Corner thereof which is the North East Corner of Cocker- mouth from thence South, thirty Degrees west five Miles & one Half- Mile by said Cockermouth, to the South Easterly Corner thereof from thence South Thirty Seven degrees West by a Tract of Land calld Cardigan Six Miles to the Northerly Line of New Chester so called ;
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THE CHARTER AND DRAFT OF LOTS.
from thence North Easterly by the Line of said New Chester about Eleven miles to Pemidgwasset River ; from thence up Said River, as the Same Trends, to the Place began at - And that the same be, and hereby is Incorporated into a Township by the name of Plymouth - And the Inhabitants that do, or shall hereafter Inhabit the Said Township, are hereby declared to be Enfranchized with and Intitled to all and every the Priviledges and Immunities that other Towns within Our Province by Law, Exercise and Enjoy : And further, that the said Town as soon as there shall be Fifty Families resident and settled thereon, shall have the Liberty of holding Two Fairs, one of which shall be held on the
And the other on the , annually, which Fairs are not to continue longer then the respective following the said
and that as soon as the said Town shall consist of Fifty Families, a Market may be opened and kept one or more Days in each Week as may be thought most advantagious to the Inhabitants. Also that the first Meeting for the Choice of Town Officers, agreable to the Laws of our said Province, Shall be held on the First Tuesday of August next which said meeting Shall be Notified by Joseph Blanchard, Esq' who is hereby also appointed the Moderator of the said first Meeting, which he is to Notify and govern agreable to the Laws and Customs of Our said Province ; and that the annual Meeting, forever, hereafter, for the choice of such Officers for the said Town shall be on the Second Tuesday of March annually. To HAVE and to HOLD the said Tract of Land, as above expressed, together with all Privileges and Appurtenances to them and their respective Heirs and Assigns forever, upon the following Conditions, viz.
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