USA > New Hampshire > Cheshire County > Jaffrey > History of the town of Jaffrey, New Hampshire, from the date of the Masonian charter to the present time, 1749-1880 : with a genealogical register of the Jaffrey families, and an appendix containing the proceedings of the centennial celebration in 1873 > Part 38
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There were provisions by which the grantors undertook to defend the title, to a certain extent.
We are interested in these conditions and provisions only as matters of history, serving to show the measures taken by the Masonian proprietors to secure the settlement of the townships which they granted, this among others.
It seems probable that none of the conditions were strictly complied with. They could not well be at that time. But so long as there were attempts, in good faith, to make settle- ments, it was not for the interest of the grantors to enforce forfeitures. Their shares became more valuable as the others were improved, and the enforcement of forfeitures, when there were attempts to perform, would have injured themselves.
I have procured, from the clerk of the Masonian proprie- tors, copies of the documents on file in his office relating to this township. A few items may perhaps be acceptable.
The grantees held a meeting at Dunstable, January 16,
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1749 or '50, at which a vote was passed that each right be laid out into three lots, and to couple them fit for drawing, -to be done by the last day of May; and that twenty pounds old tenor be raised to each right, to defray charges incidental thereto.
A plan of the township, seven miles long by five broad, laid out into ten ranges, and twenty-two lots one hundred rods wide to each range, was finished in May, 1750.
The meeting in January was adjourned to the first Tues- day in June, when it was again adjourned to the second Tuesday, at which time the lots were drawn. It is probable that some of the grantees abandoned their rights, as six shares were sold at this meeting, and the money ordered to be deposited with the treasurer, to be paid "to the first five men that goes on with their families in one year from this date, and continues there for the space of one year." There was a vote also for a committee to lay out a road from another Number Two (Wilton), through Peterborough Slip, to this township .*
The meeting was then adjourned to November 8, at which time a vote was passed prescribing the method of calling future meetings, the provision for notice being the posting of notices at Dunstable, Lunenburg, and Hollis. A further vote appointed Joseph Blanchard, Benjamin Bel- lows, and Captain Peter Powers " a Committee to manage the Prudentials for this Society."
These last votes give us a clue to the residences of some of the grantees. They, of course, belonged to the towns where notices were to be posted. Captain Peter Powers --- who was the grantee of four shares, and the purchaser of
* Lyndeborough, including the northerly part of Wilton, was laid out by Massachusetts under the claim of that colony, and granted to certain persons, mostly belonging to Salem, in consideration of their sufferings in the expedition to Canada. The residue of what is Wilton was grant- ed by the Masonian proprietors in 1749, and was called No. 2. Mason was called. No. I. Peterborough Slip comprised the towns of Temple and Sharon. This gives us the general course of the road.
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four of the six sold at auction at the first meeting, and who was one of the Committee to manage the Prudentials- must have been the first settler of Hollis, in 1731,-one of the soldiers under the celebrated Captain John Lovewell, who fell in the Indian fight at Pigwackett in 1725.
At a meeting of the grantees, August 4, 1752, a formal vote was passed to accept the title, with an acknowledgment that they held it under the conditions and limitations and reservations, by some of which there should have been clearings before that time.
Copies of the deed executed by Blanchard, and of the plan, and a list of the proprietors, were filed in the office of the grantors, September 4, 1753.
It is stated that a settlement was attempted in 1753 by Richard Peabody, Moses Stickney, and a few others, who remained but two or three years. The first native was a son of Moses Stickney, born in 1753.
The first permanent settlement was made in 1758, by John Grout and John Davidson.
There is in the files a paper containing, first, a list of settlers on the free lots, to the number of nine families ; second, a list of settlers that abide constantly on settling rights,-total, twenty-two; third, "some beginnings on set- tling rights, number, ten ; also a memorandum, "no meet- ing-house built." This is certified as a true account of the settling rights, " carefully examined and humbly submitted " by John Grout and Roger Gilmore. There is no date to it, nor any memorandum when it was received, but pinned to it is a paper signed John Gilmore and Roger Gilmore, dated March 10, 1769, addressed to "Gentlemen Grantors," set- ting forth that they bought the right that was Paul March's, January, '68, and the improvements which they have made and intend, and concluding,-"Gentlemen, we beg the favor of you, as you are men of honor, that you will not hurt us in our interest, for we have done everything in our power to bring forward the settlement of this place."
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Roger Gilmore is the only one of the earlier settlers that I am sure of having seen. He lived on the hill east of the tannery of John Cutter ; was a man of large frame and dig- nified deportment; was highly esteemed ; and was much employed as justice of the peace, surveyor, and in town offices and affairs.
There is also on file "an accompt of the settlements in Monadnock No. 2," certified by Enoch Hale, stating the names of the settlers on the several rights, and the number of the rights (ten in all) appearing to be delinquent. It is without date, but was "received March 8th, 1770," and was probably made up within a short time previously. From this it appears that there were settlements on thirty-four rights, and twelve lots (additional, as I understand) im- proved ; and that mills were erected on right 15, and a saw- mill on 4I.
And here, near the close of its unincorporated existence, let us pay a deserved tribute to the enterprise and energy of the early settlers. Struggling against obstacles that were all but insuperable, and through hardships which might well have daunted the most determined courage, they have, in a few years, brought the township largely above the average of the settlements in the county, and to a position exceeded only by towns of a longer existence, all of which had much greater facilities for access. The partic- ular obstacles which they encountered, and the details of the hardships which they endured, we cannot know. Of their personal deprivations and sufferings we fail to form an adequate conception. It is difficult to gain even a general appreciation of them.
There are, it is true, only forty miles intervening between the head-quarters, if we may so call them, at Dunstable ; but twenty or more of them are through a nearly trackless, dense forest, over a rough, rocky surface, with occasionally a small natural meadow. The pioneers make their slow, painful way, much of it through the thick underbrush,-
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the husband with an axe on his shoulders, and what he can carry of household appendages in a pack on his back, and his wife follows, somewhat similarly loaded, except the axe. Cheap land, within the reach of their scanty means, has tempted them to endurance. There may be a young man with them. God be thanked we do not see any young chil- dren. Weary, worn in spirit as well as in body, they reach the range and lot of their destination, and their first shelter is constructed of hemlock boughs, with the same material for a bedstead, and leaves for a mattress.
A rude log hut follows,* and then comes the hard strug- gle with the forest and with privation,-with the winter, its deep snows, and its intense cold. There is no communica- tion with the outward world but by " rackets " (snow-shoes), and pioneers of longer duration are in other towns, miles away. It is not necessary to put wild beasts into this pict- ure.
Is it wonderful that the settlers of '53 found this too great an endurance even for their brave hearts and strong "arms, and that they abandoned the settlement when re- maining threatened their lives? or, rather, is it not won- derful that they lived to abandon it? Surely, it was not light difficulties which would deter persons who had the courage to begin such a work from the prosecution of their purpose.
But there is another attempt at settlement made under more favorable auspices. We may suppose that the few pounds voted to be raised to make a road from Number Two have been expended. The underbrush and some of
* The log hut must have been an institution of short duration. So far as I have heard, there is little tradition of log-houses in the town. A grist- and saw-mill were erected in Peterborough as early as 1751; another saw-mill near the place of the south factory in 1758. Rev. John H. Morison, in his very interesting address at the centennial cel- ebration in Peterborough, says,-"At this period [1770] log huts were little used. Substantial frame houses, many of them two stories high, had been erected." And we have seen, from the return of 1770, that there were then two saw-mills here.
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the stones are cleared away, and trees are blazed along the route ; and another small party of settlers start, with oxen, not in yokes but single file, with such loads as they can carry strapped upon their backs. And there is a cow there. The small patches of natural meadow furnish food for the animals, and the emigrants arrive with better means of es- tablishing themselves. The trees fall, the logs are drawn, piled, burnt, a small space is cleared, a shelter is built, seed is sown, and the vegetation, anxiously watched and tended, gives a scanty crop. But sickness comes. Exposure has produced its natural result : fever is in the household. There is no physician. The medicines are the few simple remedies brought in the luggage. Acts of neighborly kind- ness would be cheerfully rendered if there were near neigh- bors, but are of difficult procurement in this forest of "mag- nificent distances ;" and all the hours of attendance by the sick-bed are so much time withdrawn from what would otherwise have been essentially necessary for labor and for rest. Alas! the kindest care, the unslumbering watch, and the fervent prayer are unavailing; and the sufferer, no longer such, is laid to final rest in some quiet corner of " the clearing."
Out of this darkness comes a brighter dawn. Lumber can be had. The mills are miles distant, to be sure, and the transportation difficult, but perseverance overcomes obstacles. "The road" has been improved. There is a horse upon the path. The rider has a young child in her lap, and one somewhat older sits behind. Her husband drives "the stock." The way is not so toilsome: there are more articles of housekeeping in the luggage, more of en- couragement, more of hope, more of fruition, more of hap- piness.
We have reached 1770, and there are several families here. The settlement is established on a firm basis. Let us never fail to do justice to the pioneers, men and women, who, with such resolute courage, fortitude, patience, and
·
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perseverance, established a civilized society in the midst of a trackless wilderness. We should do ourselves a great wrong if we did not express our deep admiration of them.
In 1771 the province was divided into counties. Prior to this time all the public offices were in Portsmouth or the vicinity, and the courts were held there.
In an act for making a new proportion of public taxes, passed May 28, 1773, which included unincorporated places, Monadnock Number Two is set down at £3 5s. in the £1,000. The proportion for Cheshire county, which until 1827 included what is now Sullivan county, was £117 8s. There were twelve towns in the county rated higher than Jaffrey, and seventeen towns and places at less. This pro- portion of the taxation serves to show, in some measure, its relative importance at that time.
The Masonian proprietors had and claimed only a right of property. Their title to the land passed by the deed authorized by them, as a deed passes the title to land at the present day, but there was no right of town government granted. The provision for taxing the shares and collect- ing the tax could only be made effectual through the laws of the province. The jurisdiction was in the governor and council and the assembly.
The grantees of the lands acted like a corporation for the division and disposition of their lands and the performance of their duties as a proprietary, but for nothing beyond. When those things were accomplished, the proprietary was at an end,-dissolved. And this was true also of the town- ships granted by the governor, outside of the limits of the Masonian lines, unless incorporated.
There was no provision in the general laws by which an assessment could be made upon the inhabitants of unincor- porated places, for which reason the act apportioning the public taxes, in 1773, contained a provision appointing per- sons, who were named, to call meetings of the inhabitants of such places ; and requiring the inhabitants at such meet-
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ings to choose the necessary officers for assessing and col- lecting the tax, and giving authority for that purpose.
And so the time had come when the interests of the peo- ple required corporate powers of a general character ; and on the 17th of August, 1773, an act of incorporation was grant- ed, nominally by His Majesty George III, but in fact by the royal governor, John Wentworth, with advice of the council, the corporate name being found in the name of one of the Masonian proprietors, who was then secretary ; and Faffrey was installed into the great brotherhood of political and municipal incorporations called towns, which have been of such incalculable benefit, not only to New England, where they originated, and of which they are the glory and the pride, but through it to the country at large.
The centuries of which we usually speak date from the commencement of the Christian era, occasionally from the period assigned by Bibical theology as the time of the crea- tion of the world. But a century may have its beginning at any point of time. That of which we now witness the close had its inception with this incorporation. If the event be supposed to be one of comparative insignificance, it was one which has had a greater absolute force for the promo- tion of the happiness of those persons inhabiting within the limits of the town, than any of the greater ones which have astonished the world.
If we should suspend, for a moment, the consideration of the local interests attached to this incorporation, and which entitle it to mark the commencement of a century, and its anniversary to a grateful recognition and celebration, and should turn our attention to the general history of the cen- tury which has followed, we should find that this century may challenge a comparison with any one which has pre- ceded it, whatever date may be assigned for the commence- ment of the latter.
But we must not undertake the centennial history of the world to-day. On our recollection of it, however, we may
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surely be pardoned if we exclaim, Great has been the cen- tury which had its commencement in the incorporation of the town of Jaffrey !
These incorporated towns had their origin in Plymouth, Duxbury, and Scituate, in the Plymouth colony, followed by Charlestown, Salem, and Newton (since Cambridge), and Dorchester, in Massachusetts ; and by Portsmouth, Dover, Exeter, and Hampton, in this state.
It has been suggested that the town organization had its origin in the Congregational church polity ; and, in fact, the organization of the church, in the earlier settlements of the Pilgrims and the Puritans, accompanied the organization of the town.
But the town grew mainly out of the secular need,-out of the democratic principle of self-government,-as is shown from the fact that changes in the modes and forms of wor- ship, and in the different church organizations, have not affected the townships and the towns ; whereas Congrega- tionalism had no existence outside of the portions of the country where these townships existed. Instead of creating townships and towns, it has not itself been created to any extent where they have not existed. It cannot well exist without them. But they now exist in the Western country, where Congregationalism has as yet little foothold,-and but for them it would have been long since merged in Presbyterianism, which has been the prevailing form of orthodoxy in all parts of the country where these towns have been unknown .*
Considering the principles and objects of the emigrants, the town system may be said to have been a necessity, in the existing state of things, in the early settlement of this part of the country. It was the only organization by and through which the settlers could best provide for their wants, and have the full enjoyment of the liberty which they prized so highly ; and they devised it accordingly.
*See NOTE 2, at the end of this address.
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The early settlers of the Plymouth colony discovered that the grant of corporate powers to the small separate settlements, and the passage of general laws giving them such powers and privileges as would enable them to provide for their local needs, and subjecting them to the perform- ance of such duties as might be required by the government of the whole colony, was the best and fittest way for the transaction of the affairs of the different localities ; and they so provided. This conclusion was reached, not through any revelation which perfected the system at once, but by degrees, through their daily and yearly experience ; and the system, inaugurated at Plymouth, commended itself to the Massachusetts colony, so that it was adopted there at the outset.
The earliest settlements in this state were commenced in a slightly different manner, Portsmouth, Dover, and Hampton being towns, independent of each other, with separate pow- ers of government, exercised by agreement, without any act of incorporation. But when the government of the colony of New Hampshire was organized, grants of townships were made, and towns incorporated.
In this organization of towns, the settlements of New England differed from those of Virginia and other Southern states, and to these towns, providing for local wants and performing local duties, New England owes much of the prosperity of which she has had a reasonable share to this day.
The early settlers in this place, like those of other towns, wanted religious teachers and institutions. This is shown not merely by the character of mankind, the nature of soci- ety, and the particular character of the parties, but by the provisions in the grant of the township giving one share for the first settled minister, and one for the support of the ministry, and by the condition requiring that a good, con- venient meeting-house should be built near the centre with- in six years.
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Whatever we may think respecting ourselves, at this later day, with our more dense population and our enlarged means, we may well conclude that at that period it was for the benefit of the civil state that the institutions of religion should be maintained through some organization having legal power to provide for the support of religious teachers. In fact, the authority of the towns to provide for the settle- ment of ministers and their support remained until 1819, although the efficiency of the law was much impaired by religious divisions at an earlier day. The clergyman had then no need to spend his summer in Europe or the Adi- rondacks. His parish being the town, his parochial visits furnished him with sufficient "muscular Christianity" for all practical purposes.
They wanted schools, and of course they needed school- houses, and for the erection of these, school-districts. The inhabitants of the town, with a full understanding of the local needs of all portions of the town, could arrange these districts ; the people of the several districts could then de- termine the situation and the size of the house required, with regard to their accommodation and pecuniary ability ; and the tax voted by the town for the support of schools, being divided in an equitable manner, could then be applied to the purposes of education in these districts with the greatest possible efficiency. The poor little school-houses would not make a great show by the side of some modern structures, but they did a work perhaps quite as useful as if the seats had had cushions and the desks had been of ma- hogany.
They wanted highways. This need of facilities for inter- communication, and for intercourse with other portions of the country, must have impressed itself upon them, by the inconveniences which they suffered, in a manner to assure an energetic use of their powers in this respect ; and the town incorporation, with its power to divide into districts for this purpose, and by the appropriation of money or
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labor, to be expended under surveyors interested to do a good work, soon rendered travel safe and even convenient. The great rocks have disappeared, one after another, under the persevering application of the highway tax, until the " drives" have, as you know, become very attractive.
The then existing modes of travel and transportation did not require roads of the most perfect construction. Chaises had not been introduced. The light Dearborn wagon had not been invented. The single horse had no difficulty in picking his way, and by skilful "hawing and geeing " the oxen and cart were enabled to avoid the more formidable obstructions. Personal transportation was mostly on horse- back, but the cart was made the carryall when several per- sons were to be conveyed. The side-saddle furnished a healthful means of locomotion for the women, and when it Decame necessary to ride double, the pillion-no longer known, alas !- formed a very comfortable seat for the lady. As it was necessary, in order to keep the seat properly, that she should pass her arm around the side of the gentle- man, this was, in some cases, a very acceptable mode of transportation, to the junior portion of the community.
No system of general legislation could provide for all these local wants and necessities according to the exigen- cies of particular cases. But the general laws enabled these small communities, acting as municipal corporations, to provide each for itself, in relation to these and other mat- ters, according to its own views of what it needed and what it could perform,-it being premised that it had needs upon some subjects, to some extent, and must perform to that extent, at least, with liberty to do more, which it usually did. Thus, it must raise a certain amount of money for the support of schools, and might raise more if deemed expedi- ent.
The powers and privileges which the towns possessed were not talents to be wrapped in a napkin and buried in the earth, nor did the people belong to the class of slothful
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and unfaithful servants who seek to escape from their duties.
There were other duties and rights attached to these incorporations. The duty of supplying the needs of the aged, infirm, and incompetent, who were unable to supply themselves, so that want and destitution should be allevi- ated and starvation unknown, was deemed a common duty of each community, and could best be performed by these incorporations.
Through them, also, the inhabitants were primarily to enjoy such political rights as were conceded to the people in the days of the province, and the more extended and ex- alted powers which were conferred by the acquisition of independence, the organization of the state, and the adop- tion of the constitution of the United States. All the rights of suffrage were to be exercised within the towif incorporation, the electors being summoned thereto by its warrants for such purposes. Again : the meetings held for these purposes gave opportunity for the full consideration and discussion of the measures required for the public good, and for the expression of the opinions of the inhabi- tants respecting them. How many of the specifications of the Declaration of Independence originated in the resolu- tions of the towns we cannot now know. Although no trace may be left, we know that there must have been arguments for and against the adoption of the constitution of the United States, when the delegates were chosen to attend the convention, which ratified it by a small majority, proposing divers amendments, most of which were adopted immediately afterwards. Some voted against the ratifica- tion, fearing that such amendments would not be made, --- perhaps so instructed by their constituents. Nothing could have been better adapted to the execution of all these pur- poses than these " Little Democracies," as de Tocqueville has called them.
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