USA > New Hampshire > Coos County > Incidents in White Mountain history, together with many interesting anecdotes illustrating life in the backwoods > Part 18
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21
An account of this has been given, in part, in the narrative of the captivity of Nathaniel Segar. What was omitted by him, not coming under his observation, we shall here give. Segar tells us that a party of Indians from the woods, painted and armed with tomahawks, came upon him and some others while in a field at Bethel, bound them, and after plundering the house and making a rude assault upon the wife of one of the prisoners, started them off, saying they were prisoners and must go to Canada. The first halt they made was at Gilead, where they killed and scalped Mr. James Pettengill. After this they crossed the Androscoggin with these pris- oners, and went to the house of Hope Austin in Shelburne.
Here they searched for plunder. Mr. Austin being away
22
254
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
from home, they told his wife to remain in the house, and she should not be hurt. Hurrying on, they went to the house of Capt. Rindge, further up the river. Here they killed and scalped Peter Poor, and took Plato, the colored man, prisoner. So far Segar, in his narrative, has traced their course, though much more minutely in its various de- tails. Now, leaving him to pass on his way to Canada with the Indians, we shall take up those parts of the sad scene which he did not witness. Hope Austin, who was at Capt. Rindge's at the time the Indians and their prisoners went into his own house, when they approached Capt. Rindge's, after seeing Poor killed, and Plato taken prisoner, fled immediately across the Androscoggin. Following down this river a mile or two, he came to the house of Mr. Daniel Ingalls. Here he found his three children. His wife had been here, brought over the river in a boat by Mr. Ingalls, but had just gone back to her house on an important errand. The children came, one with a Mrs. Wentworth, who waded the river with it in her arms, and the other two in the boat with their mother. Mrs. Austin had gone back to her house just before her husband came, in company with Mrs. Wentworth, to get some meal and bring it to Ingalls', she having more of that article than any other one in the vicinity. Very soon after Austin arrived at Mr. Ingalls', most of the neighbors came hurrying in, excited by the news of the sad affair that had just taken place near Rindge's house.
Mrs. Austin and Mrs. Wentworth not returning so soon as they were expected, the whole company crossed the river and went to Mr. Austin's house. Here they found them making all haste to gather the meal and return to Mr. Ingalls'. But after consulting awhile, and reflecting that there might be danger in all the houses, they concluded to take the meal
255
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
and some maple sugar, and go to the top of a mountain near by, and spend the night. They did this, and, after ascending its precipitous side, spent the night on the summit, in full hearing of the whoopings and shoutings of the Indians. From this circumstance the mountain has since been called " Hark Hill."
Finding, on their return from this mountain the following morning, that there were signs of Indians still in the neigh- borhood, they fled to Fryburg, all the way through the forest, fifty-nine miles from Shelburne. Here they remained till the danger was passed. Then again they sought their home in the wilderness. The season being unpropitious, the return company, numbering about twelve persons, old and young, made their way back through many hardships and sufferings. It was March, and a large quantity of snow was on the ground. Their journey about half accomplished, they encountered a terrible storm of rain. The men were com- pelled to stand out in the open air, and buffet its force through one whole night, while the women and children were protected from it only by ticks of beds drawn over poles. These exposures they endured with noble courage, and at length reached the end of their journey.
One of the most terrible encounters with wolves ever put on record is said to have taken place in this town. A Mr. Austin, returning home on a time with his team, overtook an Indian, bent almost double with the heavy pack on his back. Kindly he offered the Indian a ride, which the weary man gladly accepted. During the ride, Austin asked the Indian his name. He replied, somewhat facetiously, that John Peter or Peter John suited him, just which it pleased the fancies of others to call him. At the junction of two roads they separated, the Indian shouldering again his heavy load,
256
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
and going in an opposite direction to the team. After leav- ing Mr. Austin, a pack of famished wolves attacked the poor Indian with all the fury of starvation. How long the battle lasted we know not, nor how many remained of the hung y pack to devour the Indian ; but when the spot was visited not long after, seven carcasses of huge wolves lay beside the clothes and bones of their slayer. Seven of the monsters he had slain ere he himself yielded the struggle.
Leaving the Atlantic and St. Lawrence railroad at Straf- ford, and following up the Connecticut river to the boundary between New Hampshire and Canada, you come to a little river, one of the tributaries of the Connecticut, called " Hall's Stream." On its bank a poor soldier named Hall was drowned. The starved man dragged his skeleton body to the bank of the stream to drink. His head hung over a little descent, and, unable to raise it, he drowned, the water playing with his long hair when he was found.
At the time of the deplorable situation of the American army near Quebec, especially after the fall of the lamented Montgomery, the commander in the unsuccessful attack upon it, things became so distressing, that desertion among the famished soldiers was deemed almost a virtue. Twelve of them made their appearance in Shelburne in the autumn of 1776. They were first discovered by a negro in the employ- ment of Capt. Rindge, who succeeded, after much persuasion, in inducing them to follow him to the house of his master. Here, so far exhausted were they with hunger, that they required the strictest attention in order to be kept alive.
As soon as they were sufficiently recruited, they gave an account of the scenes through which they had passed. They told how they succeeded in getting away from the army near Quebec. They followed the course of the Chaudiere river
257
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
for a long distance, till at length they crossed the high lands and came to the Magallaway river, down which they passed to its confluence with Clear Stream, at a place called Enrol. Here they left one of their number, too feeble to follow them any further. On receiving this information, Capt. Rindge immediately prepared himself with provisions and other things necessary for a journey in the wilderness, and started in quest of the soldier left behind. He took with him Moses Ingalls, to whom we have already referred, then a young man about twenty years of age. With great speed and toil they pursued their course till they came to the place desig- nated by the soldiers in Shelburne as the one where they left their fainting comrade. After looking round, they soon found him. He had moved but little from the spot where he had been left. He lay nearly across his gun, with his long hair in the water, dead. . They buried him on the shore of the stream, and, as a memorial of the poor fellow, changed the name of the little river from Clear to "Hall's Stream."
22*
CHAPTER XIX.
GORHAM.
WHITE MOUNTAIN INDIANS. - COL. CLARK. - MOLLY OCKETT. - PEOL SUS- UP. - INDIAN ELOQUENCE. - GORHAM. - INFLUENCE OF THE RAILROAD UPON IT. - ALPINE HOUSE. - GLEN HOUSE. - MOUNT WASHINGTON ROAD. - CARRIAGES. - BUILDING OF THE "SUMMIT HOUSE."- WEATHER ON THE SUMMIT IN MAY. - ORIGIN OF PEABODY RIVER. - WONDERFUL ENDUR- ANCE OF COLD.
A FEW things remain yet to be said concerning the White Mountain Indians. Amid the obscurity and uncertainty which shroud the many traditions respecting them, we think the following facts to be authentic. During the last years of the American Revolution, the northern Indians seem to have determined to make a final struggle for their hunting-grounds and home, and Pennacook, or Rumford Falls, in Maine, was selected as the scene of their resistance to white encroachments. No general battle was fought, but after committing many murders and barbarities on the settlers, and greatly annoying them, they retired, forgetting their revenge in the sad and weak condition of their tribe. One Tom Hegan, whom we have before mentioned, was particularly active in waylaying and killing the whites. He figures conspicuously in all the cruel Indian stories of this region. Sometimes in the employ of the British, and sometimes impelled onward by his own
259
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
deep hatred, he was very bold, and bloody, and barbarous, and for a long time a terror to the settlers.
A Col. Clark, of Boston, had been in the habit of visiting annually the White Mountains, and trading for furs. Hc had thus become acquainted with all the settlers and many of the Indians. He was much esteemed for his honesty, and his visits were looked forward to with much interest. Tom Hegan had formed the design of killing him, and, contrary to his usual shrewdness, had disclosed his plans to some of his companions. One of them, in a drunken spree, told the secret to Molly Ockett, a squaw who had been converted to . Christianity, and was much loved and respected by the whites. She determined to save Clark's life. To do it, she must traverse a wilderness of many miles to his camp. But nothing daunted the courageous and faithful woman. Setting out early in the evening of the intended massacre, she reached Clark's camp just in season for him to escape. Tom Hegan had already killed two of Clark's companions, encamped a mile or two from him. He made good his escape, with his noble preserver, to the settlements. Col. Clark's gratitude knew no bounds. In every way he sought to reward the kind squaw for the noble act she had performed. For a long time she resisted all his attempts to repay her, until at last, overcome by his earnest entreaties and the difficulty of sustain- ing herself in her old age, she became an inmate of his fam- ily, in Boston. For a year she bore, with a martyr's endur- ance, the restraints of civilized life; but at length she could do it no longer. She must dic, she said, in the great forest,
amid the trees, the companions of her youth. Devotedly pious, she sighed for the woods, where, under the clear blue sky, she might pray to God as she had when first converted. Clark saw her distress, and built her a wigwam on the Falls
260
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
of the Pennacook, and there supported her the remainder of her days. Often did he visit her, bringing the necessary provision for her sustenance.
It is the tragical end of this same Tom Hegan, we think, which is so commonly remembered by many of the old inhab- itants in Maine, even to this day. "He was tied upon a horse, with spurs on his heels, in such a manner that the spurs continually goaded the animal. When the horse was set at liberty, he ran furiously through an orchard, and the craggy limbs of the trees tore him to pieces."
A daughter of this Molly Ockett married one Peol Susup, we think the one who was afterwards tried for murder at Castine. This Peol Susup was a Penobscot Indian ; but the northern and eastern tribes freely intermarried, we believe. " All the tribes between the Saco and the St. John, both in- clusive, are brothers."
As a specimen of Indian oratory, the speech of John Neptune, the chief of the tribe, at the trial of Susup, may not be uninteresting. "The case was nearly as follows : - On the evening of the 28th of June, 1816, this Indian was intoxicated, and at the tavern of one Knight, at Bangor (whether he had procured liquor there with which to intoxi- cate himself, we are not informed) ; and being noisy and tur- bulent, Knight endeavored to expel him from his house. Having thrust him out of doors, he endeavored to drive him away, and in the attempt was stabbed, and immediately died. On his arrest, Susup acknowledged his guilt, but said he was in liquor, and that Knight abused him, or he had not done it. Being brought to trial in June, the next year, at Cas- tine, by advice of counsel he pleaded not guilty ; and, after a day spent in his trial, a verdict was rendered according to the defence set up, manslaughter.
261
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
" After the sentence was declared, Susup was asked by the court if he had anything to say for himself; to which he replied, 'John Neptune will speak for me.' Neptune rose up, and, having advanced towards the judges, deliberately said, in English :
"' You know your people do my Indians great deal wrong. They abuse them very much, -yes, they murder them. Then they walk right off ; nobody touches them. This makes my heart burn. Well, then, my Indians say, "We will go kill your very bad and wicked men." No, I tell 'em, never do that thing - we are brothers. Some time ago, a very bad man about Boston shot an Indian dead. Your people said, surely he should die ; but it was not so. In the great prison-house he cats and lives to this day. Certainly he never dies for killing Indian. My brother say let that bloody man go free - Peol Susup too. So we wish. Hope fills the hearts of us all. Peace is good. These my In- dians love it well. They smile under its shade. The white men and red men must be always friends. The Great Spirit is our father. I speak what I feel.'
" Susup was sentenced to another year's imprisonment, and required to find sureties for keeping the peace two years in the penal sum of five hundred dollars, when John Nep- tune, Squire Jo Merry Neptune, of his own tribe, Captain Solmond, from Passamaquoddy, and Captain Jo Tomer, from the river St. John, became his sureties in the cogni- zance."
Gorham is a rough, unproductive township, lying on the northerly base of the mountains. It was formerly called Shelburne Addition ; but was incorporated by its present name, June 18th, 1836. Numerous streams descend from the mountains, through this town, into the Androscoggin.
-
262
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
The opening of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad brought this little town out from the greatest obscurity, and it has become one of the great resorts for the travelling community. Its peculiarly favorable situation for viewing the mountains was never known, until travellers, posting through its borders for other destinations, were compelled to admire its beauties.
Immediately on the completion of the railroad to this point, the Alpine House was erected, and the announcement made that the cars set passengers down at the very base of the White Mountains. People, for a moment, were dumb
with astonishment. It had never been supposed that there was any north or south, or east or west, to these old heights ; but that every one who visited them must make up his mind for a long stage-coach ride through Conway or Littleton, and ultimately be set down at the Crawford or Fabyan's. That the cars should actually carry visitors to the base of the mountains was something which every one had supposed would take place in the far-off future, but not until they themselves had ceased to travel; but it was certainly so ; and the Alpine House and Gorham had become familiar words to travellers.
The Alpine House is a large hotel, owned by the railroad company. It is some distance from the base of the moun- tains, which are seldom ascended from this point; but for quiet and comfort, and beautiful drives, it is surpassed by no house at the mountains. A beautiful little village has sprung up around it, consisting mostly of buildings owned by the company. The post-office is kept here, and the telegraph affords an excellent opportunity to business men to visit the mountains, and attend to their business at the same time, Mount Moriah, Randolph Hill, Berlin Falls, and Lary's, should all be visited before the traveller takes his departure.
MT. JEFFERSON AND ADAMS FROM THE GLEN HOUSE
S21
-
263
-
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
The Glen House is seven miles from the Alpine House, in the valley of the Peabody river, immediately under Mount Washington, and in the midst of the loftiest summits in the whole mountain district. The house is situated in Bellows' Clearing, which contains about a hundred acres. For a base view of the mountains, no spot could be selected so good. Several huge mountains show themselves proudly to view, in front of the piazza, nothing intervening to obscure their giant forms. "You see them before you in all their noble, calm and silent grandeur, severally seeming the repose of power and strength. On the left is the mountain bearing the worthiest name our country ever gave us. Toward the right of its rock-crowned summit rise, in full view, the celebrated peaks of Adams and Jefferson-the one pointed, the other rounded. On both wings of these towering summits are the tops of lesser elevations. In an opposite direction, fronting the ' patriot group,' of gigantic forms, is the long, irregular rise of Carter Mountains."
The carriage road to the summit of Mount Washington starts from this point. We have described this road in a previous chapter, but find the following additional facts in a late Boston paper. Such a gigantic enterprise cannot be too often referred to. " The Mount Washington Road Company are now pushing on the work of grading up the mountain, as rapidly as possible. Between two and three miles are fin- ished, and the whole is to be completed this fall. The car- riages, of which we have just seen a model, are to be of omnibus form, each to hold twelve persons. The vehicles are to be drawn by four horses. The passengers will not sit facing each other, nor facing the front, but half way between these two positions. A separate seat is arranged for each
264
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
passenger, and each carriage has only twelve seats inside. The body of the carriage is so arranged as to be raised in front in ascending, and in the rear in descending the moun- tains, so as to always keep the body on a level. The brake is so applied to the wheels as to insure perfect safety, being operated much in the same way as railroad-car brakes. The only difference is, that these are moved by the feet of the driver instead of his hands. A safety-strap passes up into the carriage, and, by a ring lying on the bottom, the motion of the horses may be arrested by any one of the pas- sengers, if necessary.
" The carriages are to be built by Downing and Sons, Con- cord, N. H., and with a view of embodying these improve- ments, which are all made by D. O. Macomber, Esq., Presi- dent of the Road Company, they have constructed the model examined by us yesterday. The character of Downing and Sons, and their fame as omnibus and carriage builders, is a guaranty that the workmanship will be of a superior kind, and worthy of the elevated use of the vehicles."
The building of the Summit House, on the top of Mount Washington, was a noble undertaking. No one but a Yankee would ever have thought of building a house where hereto- fore men had hardly been able, on account of the cold, and wind, and storms, to remain long enough to obtain a satisfac- tory view of what surrounded them. The bold thought, we believe, is due to Joseph S. Hall, who was a guide from the Notch House for many years, and who saw the necessity of a shelter at the summit.
Mr. Hall disclosed his plans to a Mr. Rosebrook, a brother farmer of Jefferson, and together they determined to under- take the task. No one surely owned the top of Mount Washington ; no one ever thought of owning it, save one
265
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
Nazro, a moon-mad Jew, who sought to establish tolls around the summit, and himself sat down to collect the fees. But to make all sure, a lawyer was employed to search the records at Concord, and it was fully ascertained that the State of New Hampshire had never granted to any one the acre of solid rock which crowned Mount Washington. J. M. Thomp- son, Esq., the landlord of the Glen House, granted them for a small compensation the use of his bridle-path, over which to transport their material; and the first day of June, 1852, they broke ground, or rather rock, for their house, and, the twenty-fifth day of July, sat down to dinner in it, with the outside completed. The state of the atmosphere on the summit, during these carly months, may be imagined from an account of an ascent made in the month of May, the 9th instant, this year, 1855.
" The second and third miles we found the snow from two to four feet deep, and with sufficient crust for snow-shoeing. At the old 'half-way camp,' we left our snow-shoes, and pro- ceeded on an icy crust, so solid that a heel stamp would scarcely dent it. All the high mountain streams are yet fettered by the strong chain of winter, and in several places we were compelled to cut stepping-places in the ice with our hatchets, that we might advance. In this manner we at last arrived at the foot of the highest crag, when, trumpeted along by the deafening roar of high wintry wind, a frost-cloud came over us, and shrouded us in white. We found our houses yet firmly resisting the destructive power that freely moves around them in this exposed latitude; and after much difficulty succeeded in entering the Tip-Top house by a back window. The doors and windows of both houses were securely covered with a glistening crust of thick frost, and against the doors snow was banked up so solid, that even with a good axe
23
266
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
and spade, I think we could not have lived to cut away an entrance, with the wind and sleet so strong against us. I can say truly, that, entering as we did on one side sheltered by rocks from the wind, we were compelled to make constant and active exertion to keep from freezing, with thick gloves and heavy outside coats. In short, we went prepared with a thorough winter dress."
A camp was built about half way up the mountain, in the small growth of spruce and pine, which was to be their home while building the house. Several tough, scrubby mountain horses and pack-saddles were purchased, and a number of stout, able-bodied men were hired. Thus pre- pared, they at length commenced operations. A few com- menced blasting heavy blocks of stone from the solid mountain itself, and laying up the walls of the house. A few were employed down at the camp in hewing timbers and riving shingles, and the remainder brought up from the valley below, on their own shoulders, and on the horses, boards and " fixins" for the finishing. Those on the summit could work but a few hours during the day, and some days not any. Occasionally, clouds of sleet and snow would come drifting over the summit, so frosty and biting, that the utmost exertion could only save them from being thoroughly numbed. Their only safety then was in fleeing to their camp. Thus whole days would be spent in going to and from their work. Around the summit it would appear all clear and comfortable, and up they would go to their labor. Hardly would they be fairly commenced, when some sudden storm would come upon them, and down they would be forced to go to their shelter. Seldom more than two or three con- secutive hours could they work at once. The house was located under the lee of the highest rock on Mount Wash-
-
RICHARDSON
SUMMIT HOUSE.
267
INCIDENTS IN WHITE MOUNTAIN HISTORY.
ington, and was laid out forty feet long, and twenty-two feet wide. The walls were four feet thick, laid in cement, and every stone had to be raised to its place by muscular strength alone.
While these were laying the walls, the material for finish- ing and furnishing were being dragged up from the Glen House, a distance of six miles. Lime, boards, nails, shingles, timbers, furniture, crockery, bedding and stoves, all had to be brought up by piecemeal on the men's or horses' backs. No one ever went up without taking something - a chair, or door, or piece of crockery. Four boards (about sixty feet) could be carried up at once on a horse's back, and, but one trip could be made daily. Mr. Rosebrook, a young giant, carried up at one time a door of the usual length, three feet wide, three and one half inches thick, ten pounds of pork, and one gallon of molasses.
The walls were raised eight feet high, and to these the roof was fastened by strong iron bolts ; while over the whole structure were passed strong cables, fastened to the solid mountain itself. The inside was thrown, primitive fashion, into one room, in which the beds were arranged, berth-like, for the most part on one side of the room, in two tiers, with curtains in front. A table, capable of seating thirty or forty persons, ran lengthwise of the room. At one end of the room a cooking-stove and the other furniture of a kitchen were placed, with a curtain between it and the table. At the other end was a small stove, in which was burned mountain moss. The walls are perfectly rough, outside and in ; a little plaster upon the inside merely fills up the chinks. The house trembles and creaks in the gale, but stands strong. Says one : " The Summit House is quite as good a place as a ' cottage chamber,' wherein to listen to the strain,
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.