USA > New Hampshire > Hillsborough County > New Ipswich > The history of New Ipswich, New Hampshire, 1735-1914, with genealogical records of the principal families > Part 2
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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 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
Unfortunately, whatever local records may have been made prior to the Masonian grant, they have entirely disappeared, and the lines of intercommunication between the twenty families which gathered in those early years can be learned only by inference, occasionally aided by traces of old path- ways by which the early pioneers, like their immediate suc- cessors, were prone to connect their homes, by the nearest or most practicable route, to the older main line of communi- cation with the towns and settlements above and below. But the later records containing references to "paths" and some- times officially legalizing highways "where the people now travel" suggest that the stern demands of daily life left the first occupants of the coming town but little time or energy for public labors, especially after it was found, as related in a later chapter, that the title by which they held their lands was far from secure. They might be expected to content themselves for a time with paths not greatly surpassing the
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History of New Ipswich
trails of their Indian predecessors, and so the roads located by the most convenient footpaths from cabin to cabin, wind- ing deviously around the varied obstructions of the wilder- ness, might almost be said, like Topsy, never to have been made but to have "growed."
But with the Masonian charter came an assurance that the work was to continue, and on June 20, 1750, only two months after the signing of that charter, the proprietors of the township voted to build a bridge "near where the former bridge was built," that is, at the crossing of the river by the "country road," and less than a year later a second bridge was voted "near the mills," or practically in the place now held by its successor below the "High Bridge." Abundant provision for meeting the principal obstruction to free com- munication between the different parts of the settled region having thus been made, at the same meeting in May, 1751, Timothy Heald, Joseph Stevens, and Reuben Kidder were chosen a committee to lay out and repair highways, and were directed "to lay out a way from the saw mill &c. up by the Path leading to John Brown's and also to Abijah Foster's as it will best accommodate both, and if said Committee thinks Proper to lay out a way to Archibald White's, as also to Aaron Kidder's." The exact position of the home of John Brown is uncertain, but it was in the northeastern part of the town, near the locality afterward long occupied by the family of Supply Wilson, and most probably near the site of an old cellar in 31, N. D., still faintly visible upon the east side of the Temple road a little farther north than the house of Ralph E. Parker. Abijah Foster must have lived at that time on the present site of Davis Village, 45, N. D., which must have made the duty of the committee to "accom- modate both" somewhat difficult. Archibald White, upon 19, N. D., afterward occupied by the Prichards and later by the Tenneys, was in the same general region as John Brown, and there are indications of an early road connecting them. Aaron Kidder was upon XV: 1, S. R., a mile beyond Abijah Foster, and very probably the now long-closed road through XIII : 1 and XIV: 1, N. D., north of the house of George S. Wheeler, was located at that time.
In obedience to instructions given at this meeting that the committee should "view and lay out a Road from the line of said township so as it will accommodate the travelling up to
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New Highways
Peterboro and lay the same before said Proprietee at the next meeting," the committee a month later recommended action at once adopted by the meeting, and it was "Voted to Except the country Road as it is Layed out from Timothy Healds or the province line near his house and up by Ruben Kidders & to the line of Striptown or Peterborow Slip so called near about the road wheare people now Travil and as marks direct."
At the same meeting it was voted to "lay out a road Down from the mills by Benjamin Hoar to the Town Road by Timothy Healds," which seems to be the authority for the present road from the Taylor house on the turnpike up through Bank Village to the crossing of the "country road" and the road to the Gibson corners.
In the following year, 1753, a desire for nearer relation to the neighbors at the west was manifested by a vote "to lay out a way through our town to Rowly Canada line;" and a year later it was "Voted to turn the road that goes to Rowly Canada through Oliver Proctor's lot to the road that was formerly laid out and travelled in." As no record of the position of the "former road" has been found, it is perhaps a fair inference that the removal of a portion of the road to Rowley Canada (Rindge) from Oliver Proctor's lot, 37, N. D., located it in the broad road extending due west before men- tioned as shown on the map of the Massachusetts grant, and still plainly existent from the Center Village to Davis Village, and that it continued on the road provided for Aaron Kidder two years earlier, and thence through the uninhabited wilder- ness, over the mountain between the Barrett and Pratt peaks practically as shown upon the map. This road can be traced with difficulty through the thick undergrowth, but the dwell- ings upon it farther west than the Ephraim Adams farm, 61, N. D., have been very few.
On November 24, 1754, the proprietors by a single vote accepted four miles of road or more, probably including many short roads and "paths" previously used, but having no legal existence as highways. This long and devious thoroughfare commenced in I: 3, S. R., upon the "country road" about one-fourth of a mile after its entrance from that part of the Townsend grant which had become Mason, and extending to the north and west, passed the house of Ebenezer Bullard in I: 2, S. R., and of Joseph Bullard in II : 2, S. R., through II :
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History of New Ipswich
1, S. R., not yet the home of Moses Tucker, still resident on the "country road," and through III: 1, S. R., to Chandler's mills in IV: 1, S. R., immediately below the site of the pres- ent factory below the High Bridge. Thence the road con- tinued northwesterly a little north of the present position of the road, and entered upon the route to be occupied a half- century later by the turnpike a short distance eastward of the position of the present bridge across Kidder or Saw Mill Brook. From that point the road has remained practically unchanged in position, through lots 21, 25, 29, 30, 31, and 32, N. D., to the Temple town line, passing the homes of Ephraim and Benjamin Adams, Jonathan Stevens and John Brown.
The year 1755 saw the birth of several new highways, testifying to a considerable advance of the populated region toward the south and the west, two of which are here given in detail. The first of these extended from the northeast corner of the lot of Zachariah Adams, X: 3, S. R., past the house of Abijah Foster, who had built his third residence on IX: 2, S. R., the present residence of Walter S. Thayer being across the road from its site, and continued on an easterly course not very distant from the present road to the Congregational church, although that later road is much more nearly straight than the ancient highway, four sections, to- gether constituting more than half its length, having been moved northerly or southerly in some places as much as twenty rods. The early road passed the site of the coming church near the present southern limit of the common, and ended in "the road that goes out of the Country road to the dwelling house of Benjamin Safford," which was thirty rods or more south from the church site. The road designated as going from the "country road" is now obliterated for a con- siderable part of its length, but is still known as "Safford lane." The cellar of Zachariah Adams, still remaining in a pasture rapidly becoming forest, is shown upon the map.
The second new road, apparently accepted very largely in anticipation of expected new residents, began "at the South of lot Number 187, at the head of the road that goes from said lot to the east line of said Township." Lot 187, as also Nos. 44, 29 (or 2), 28, and 24, through which the road from the east township line passes, lie in "New Laid Out" range of lots, and there appears no record of residence in any of those southeastern lots at as early a date as that action.
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New Highways
Perhaps, however, the travel to and from Townsend, then holding the position of a connecting link with the older set- tlements, may have called for the new road to "the old meeting house hill so called" eastward from the site of the present Academy. From 187, ere long to be occupied by Col. Thomas Heald, and later by the Estabrooks tavern and by Job Davis and his son John U. in succession, the new road passed through lots 12 and 1, N. L. O., then the property of Samuel Whittemore, to the "south side of Jesse Fletcher's house said house standing on lott No. 4 in the 5th range," long after the farm of Dr. Stillman Gibson, then turned toward the north, and in VI: 4, S. R., crossed the North Branch of the Souhegan at a point still marked by remaining stone- work of a bridge, passed, in VI: 3, S. R., the place soon to be known as the home of Peletiah Whittemore, later the sum- mer home of Dr. F. W. Jones, in VII: 3, S. R., the future site of the home of the Shattucks, the Farwells, and the Wil- lards in succession, and finally along the western line of VII : 2 and VII: 1, S. R., passing the house of Benjamin Safford and ending at the "country road," having in its progress legal- ized as a highway "Safford lane," mentioned in the record two months earlier, but then probably a private way.
In the same year a road was accepted "beginning at the Country Road neare the Bridges by Joseph Kidder's meddow so on the Comon land to lott No. 29, N. D.," that is, referring to present conditions, from the bridge between the Baptist church and the Soldiers' Monument eastward past the Dr. Preston house, afterward that of Seth King. Thence the road continued as at present across the turnpike, "over the saw- mill Brook and on as marks direct into the road that from mr. Jonathan Stevens to the mills and so in that road to said Stevens house" (26, N. D., later owned by Mark Farrar, and at present by A. E. Jowders). The road thence passed on the south side of the Stevens house to lot 22, N. D., where it passed on the north of the Benjamin Knowlton-later the Chickering-house and northerly across the corner of lot 23, N. D., the future home of Capt. Ezra Towne, to 19, N. D., the home of Archibald White.
In 1756 a road was accepted "from Abba Severons to the North end of Zachariah Adams' Lot," but the location of the beginning of that road is not quite definite. Abba Sev- erance had a lot in the northeasterly part of the town, but
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History of New Ipswich
the lot named in the road record must have been in "New Laid Out" range, probably lot 64, since the road ran northerly through the lot of David Nevins, XI: 4, S. R., and, as it can now be seen, along the eastern end of the south burying- ground, which was not established until twenty years later. Having crossed the river a short distance north of the present burying-ground, it continued its northerly course nearly upon the line between the tenth and eleventh south ranges for almost half a mile, and then turning eastward across X: 3, S. R., it soon connected with the road to Abijah Foster's, and seemed about to become a principal highway. But its route is now entirely obliterated, except its first quarter-mile, which is perhaps still the road to the farm so long owned by William Wheeler and his sons, and the brief extent be- side the burying-ground, which was longer retained in use by the later opening of another road extending in a more westerly direction than the first road, past the "Spaulding house" on XI: 3, S. R., a short distance to the west, and, at the northeast corner of the lot of Robert Crosby, later the "Fox farm," XII: 3, S. R., uniting with a road, accepted in 1759, along the eastern side of XII: 2, S. R., then the property of Amos Taylor, but afterward for many years known as the "Bucknam farm." A road from Amos Taylor's had been accepted at about the same date as the one from Abba Severance's, running easterly across XI: 1, S. R., and northerly along the east side of the same lot to a point on the broad central line of the town before mentioned about a quarter-mile west from the meeting-house, then in process of construction. This road was long known as the "malt- house road," and the cellar of the malt-house still remains on the east side of its namesake thoroughfare and a quarter- mile south from the central road. The "malt-house road" is still easily followed, but only the part lying on the west side of the road from Davis Village is now open. The three roads together for a considerable period furnished the favorite route to the meeting-house for the residents in the south- western part of the town. Apparently there were two or more dwellings on this road south of Amos Taylor's, but the names of the residents do not appear.
In 1757 money was voted to make a road between Zacha- riah Adams's and Thomas Adams's, and as a bridge was nec- essary upon this way it may be inferred that the residence
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New Highways
of this latter Adams was on the southern side of the North Branch of the river. Probably this road through the greater part of its length was the road to Smith Village over "Apple- ton Hill," in nearly its position until its improvement fifty years ago by removal a little way toward the east.
At the meeting in 1757, however, the needs of other than the newer portion of the township were considered, as a new road, now nearly if not quite obliterated, was recorded ex- tending from the road accepted two years before between Jonathan Stevens and Benjamin Knowlton, northerly to the central part of 27, N. D., a lot now long vacated, but then the home of Benjamin Proctor; and also another road be- ginning at the road between Benjamin Adams's, 25, N. D., (now Reed Tenney's,) and Jonathan Stevens's, 26, N. D., (now A. E. Jowders's,) extending westward to Benjamin King's, 34, N. D., (now H. Rafeuse's,) thence westerly and southerly to the mill upon "Saw Mill Brook," and south through Oliver Proctor's lot, 37, N. D., to the "country road." The follow- ing condition affixed to the acceptance of that road brings into clear recognition one difference between those days and this age of automobiles: "The road from the mill brook to Oliver Proctor's house and to the main road shall be a bridle road free from any incumbrance of the sd. Proctor's except good gates which are to be built and maintained at his cost except the outside gate next ye main road which is to be built by the Propty and maintained by said Proctor."
The highways of the town seem to have been but slightly extended during 1758, but the records present the acceptance of two short roads ; the first from the home of Abba Severance, then resident in 14, N. D., for many years the "Mansfield farm," through 18, N. D., owned by Peter Fletcher, to the house of Benjamin Knowlton, on 24, N. D., thus nearly completing the present "back Greenville road" to the town line; and a short road now traced with considerable difficulty, from the home of Benjamin King, 34, N. D., to the southwesterly cor- ner of Joseph Stevens's lot, 35, N. D.
Three roads of 1759 in as many different sections show the steady progress during that year. The first extended from Ebenezer Heald's in III: 4, S. R., northerly "to ye Main Road." Indications of several cellars remain on or near its line, but the road has now practically disappeared, as also the probably older road of which no record appears, half a
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History of New Ipswich
mile or more in length, running southerly from Ebenezer Heald's to Col. Thomas Heald's, 187, N. L. O., on the "South Road" located two years earlier, as previously stated.
A second road of 1759 continued the "South Road" a mile farther westward, from the home of Simeon Fletcher, who had succeeded Peter Fletcher, resident upon V: 4, S. R., in 1755, past the farm perhaps already owned by John Brooks, but since Revolutionary days occupied by successive genera- tions of the Goen family, to Smith Village, which, however, it did not enter as at present near the bridge, but farther southward, where since 1838 the Smithville school-house has stood. The third road of that year shows the advance of the line of settlements toward the western part of the town by the provision for a road, still traceable, between the lots of Thomas Fletcher, 45, N. D., and Ichabod Howe, 49, N. D., to the "country road a little south of Reuben Kidder's dwell- ing," and at its southern end connecting with the Rindge road of five or six years' earlier establishment. A portion of the southern Rindge road also took its place as a road from Thomas Adams's house, one of the very few then on the present site of Smithville, to the home of Simeon Hildreth on XII : 4, S. R., later the "Chandler farm."
The records of 1760 and 1761 show few new roads, but one should perhaps be mentioned from the home of Simeon Gould, 40, N. D., through the Joseph Stevens lot, 35, N. D., for many later years the "Wilson farm," to the "road to the meeting house" along the eastern side of Stevens's lot. Dur- ing the earlier period of Mr. Gould's residence, probably quite brief, it may be assumed that the route of his Sunday travel was along the still remaining path extending southerly through 43, N. D., the home of his brother Nathaniel, and 38, N. D., ten years later the home of Francis Appleton, and thence probably on or near the line of the road, the northern half-mile of which is now unused, to the mill road, already three or four years old.
In 1762 the settlement of Nathaniel Carlton upon the farm long the home of Phineas Pratt and later of Amos J. Proctor, XIV : 2, S. R., called for the road, still in constant use, ex- tending westerly and northerly from the Carlton home and joining the Rindge road at a point a little westward from the old school-house of the "North District," No. 7, serving for many years as a poultry-house on the farm of George S.
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New Highways
Wheeler; and the progress of settlement in that part of the town is further evidenced by the record, less than a year later, of roads from the home of Isaac Howe to those of two of his neighbors on this frontier line, William Spear and Thomas Brown. Mr. Howe was the predecessor of Samuel C. Wheeler in the possession of 57, N. D., living in the wooden house, or at least on the same site, occupied by Mr. Wheeler until his erection of a brick dwelling a little northerly on the turnpike. William Spear's lot was the next to Mr. Howe's on the west, 61, N. D. His house long ago vanished, and the road by which it was approached can be followed only by careful search. The position of Thomas Brown is not quite certain, as the name is recorded as that of an early resident of 58, N. D., the nearest lot to that of Mr. Howe upon his north, and also in the same manner, on a different record, as living upon 70, N. D., a half-mile farther toward the west. It seems probable that he first settled upon the more distant lot, removing later to the more eastern one. If so, no successor chose the more elevated residence, while the nearly unbroken line of dwellers in the somewhat more accessible location testifies to its more desirable character and makes the assumed removal probable. But the road upon which Mr. Howe would have sought lot 70 would have taken him through lot 58, and is clearly evident through its full extent, although entirely impassable after crossing the turn- pike; a new road leaving the turnpike some distance farther west than the old road now offers somewhat easier access to the house on 58, in later years known as the "Gilson house," which is now at the end of the road. For many years the road there divided, one branch extending to the "old country road," a quarter-mile north of Reuben Kidder's, and the other to lot 70, as above stated, but midway thither sending off a branch meeting the north line of the town at a point near the common corner of Temple and Sharon. That the farther of the two lots was the home of Mr. Brown at the time now considered is made more probable by the record of acceptance, two years later, of a "Bridle Road Beginning at the southwest corner of Josiah Walton's lot thence on the west line of Josiah Brown's lott to the Road from Thomas Browns Down to Isaac How's." The value of those roads in the early days is indicated by a vote passed eight years later to "Except the Road from Ringe by Josiah Browns to
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History of New Ipswich
Edmund Briants," evidently composed of both the roads just mentioned as diverging from lot 58, and also nearly three miles of road now nearly or quite unused, but in early days passing the homes of Timothy Stearns, 151, A. D., Henry Fletcher, 152, A. D., David Rumrill, 138, A. D., and others, and leaving the town three-fourths of a mile south from its northwest corner.
In 1764 a road was accepted from the north line of the town past the house of Capt. Joseph Parker in 44, N. D., afterward the site of the New Ipswich Water Cure, to the home of Simeon Gould in 40, N. D., where it joined the earlier road to the embryonic Center Village. There are quite clear indications that before this new road was opened there had been a primitive thoroughfare from northern lo- calities which passed by Simeon Gould's and was probably continuous with the southerly path previously mentioned as passing the Francis Appleton house. Very possibly the tra- ditions of the youthful matrons of Temple who were accus- tomed to come, in equestrian style of those days, to the Sunday services of New Ipswich, antedating those of their later settled homes, may have survived in recollections of the passage through that woodland path. At the same meeting was accepted a road commencing at the road "from Dor- chester Canada" (now Ashburnham) a little north of the house of Hezekiah Corey on 79, A. D., and extending south- westerly to the house of Joel Crosby on 81, A. D., the lo- cation of which is still preserved by the remaining traces of a cellar upon the west side of the old road, now barely passable at that point, which leads from Smith Village to the old "Breed farms," 80, A. D .. now owned by Frederic and Willis Mansfield, and 82, A. D., at the end of the road, long the home of the retired seaman, Samuel Chandler.
By action taken in 1765 and somewhat modified in 1767 and 1770, provision was made for the convenience of a sec- tion of the town near the southern line, along which settle- ment was apparently advancing at that date, but in which the means of intercommunication seem in most places to have been private roads not yet legalized by the town. The various votes of that period of adjustment located two roads ; first, a part of the present southern road to Rindge, extend- ing from the eastern side of XII: 4, S. R., then the home of Lieut. Stephen Adams, Jr., and later the property of Roger
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New Highways
Chandler and his descendants, through a corner of XIII: 4, S. R., then the home of Col. Joseph Parker, and onward through the land of Simeon Wright, 98, N. L. O., later the home of Roger Ryan, John Nutting, and Almon A. Hill in succession, to a point somewhat west of the summit of Binney Hill, 100, N. L. O., where were then the homes of John Walker and Oliver Wright. From that point it would seem that a passable way, private or accepted by the town, may be assumed as offering passage to the "Governor's Road," extending from "Governor's Hill," as the western side of Binney Hill was termed, across the state line at lot 86, A. D.
The second road of that location and period diverged southerly from the first road just given near the line be- tween XI: 4 and XII: 4, S. R., passed just west of the barn of Samuel Parker, whose home was on XI : 4, where a cellar, now entirely evident, probably marks the place of his resi- dence, through the land of Simeon Hildreth, a part of XII : 4, whence the traces of his cellar were removed more than fifty years ago, to the home of Dea. James Chandler on the summit of "Page Hill," XIII : 2, N. L. O., thence through the farms of Jesse and Abraham Carlton, 85, A. D., later the Stone farm, and that of Stephen Adams, Sr., 84, A. D., for many years the Blanchard farm, and finally reached the lot of John Wheeler, 86, A. D., at or near the state line, where in due time union was made with the "Governor's Road" before mentioned. The part of that road lying north of Dea. Chandler's has long been discontinued, having been replaced by the road ascending Page Hill from Smith Vil- lage more directly, but the old way is easily followed through most of its extent. The more southern portion of the road was subjected to frequent minor changes of position in early years, but the road practically the same still continues to do the duty for which it was designed.
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