USA > Rhode Island > Newport County > History of Newport County, Rhode Island. From the year 1638 to the year 1887, including the settlement of its towns, and their subsequent progress > Part 84
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Beginning then at the northern bound of the purchase, lots from lifty-two to fifty-six rods wide were laid out on the river or bay, extending in length eastward to that bonnd mentioned in the vote just quoted.
The landmarks referred to by the surveyors as " The bounds of the Great Lots" were principally the trees which they marked and numbered. At the left of the description of each lot is set in the margin of the record the number of the lot. The record shows " the name of the owner of the said lot as they fell by alotment, set in the margent."
892
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
1 Edward Gray
16 John Cook
2 Edward Gray
17 Christopher Almy
3 William Manchester 18 Job Almy
4 Edward Gray 19 John Cook
5 William Manchester
20 Gideon Freeborn
6 Benjamin Church
21 Edward Wanton
7 Christopher Almy
22 William Cory
8 Edward Gray
23 Thomas Waite
9 Christopher Almy
24 Job Almy
10 Daniel Wilcox
25 Edward Gray
11 Job Almy
26 Edward Gray
12 Edward Gray
27 Nathaniel Thomas
13 Jacob Mott
28 Christopher Almy
14 Nathaniel Thomas
29 Nathaniel Thomas
15 Edward Gray
30 Edward Gray
In the twenty-fourth lot Robert Hazzard had a one-half in- terest with Job Almy. These fourteen owners of the "Great Lots" included the eight original purchasers of the tract. Be- tween the twelfth and thirteenth lots was a highway, and be- tween the twenty-third and twenty-fourth lots was the ferry lot, with a highway on either side, and the "land laid out for the ministry."
The thirty farms above mentioned covered the whole water front or western boundary of the Pocasset purchase except the water power "Common " at the north and the thirty house lots and the beaches adjacent, near the present village of Tiverton. The division into thirty farms was merely for convenience in allotting the land among the eight proprietors and their five assigns according to their several unequal investments. In the same manner the house lots were thirty in number and were al- lotted to the same thirteen men. The survey and the allotment is recorded as-
" The bounds of Pocasset House Lots as they were laid out by the persons chosen for that end April 21st, 1681, with the names of the owners as the lots fell, set in the margent * #
" The first lot is bounded Northward by the land
Gideon laid out for the Ministry and rangeth East
1 South East eighty rod & is eight rod wide
Freeborn bounded southward with a sapling at the fort marked l. & a stake marked 1. 2."
In the same manner the other lots were described, bounded and numbered, and the names of the owners entered.
893
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
2 Nathaniel Thomas
3 Edward Gray
4 William Manchester
5 Nathaniel Thomas
6 Nathaniel Thomas
" Ministers lot."
7 Christopher Almy
18 John Cook
19 Christopher Almy
20 Edward Gray
21 Thomas Waite
22 Edward Wanton
11 Christopher Almy
12 Edward Gray
13 John Cook
24 Edward Gray
25 Edward Gray
26 Jacob Mott
27 Edward Gray
28 Willian Manchester
29 Christopher Almy
30 Edward Gray.
" The ferry lot which lieth over against Sanford Henry "
23 William Cory
14 Daniel Wilcox
15 Edward Gray
16 Job Almy
17 Job Almy
" The highway "
" The ground ordered for a training field burying place & to build a meeting house on."
8 Benjamin Church
9 Edward Gray
10 Job Almy
The following document would indicate that a common, in- cluding the beaches sonth of the stone bridge, was reserved as not included in the thirty house lots, a question of great interest of late as related to the proposed railroad along this beach.
" To the Proprietors of the Town of Tiverton now met in their meeting in Said Tiverton, This Twenty-fifth day of March A. D. 1772. Whereas Yo'r. Petitioner having together with his Son purchased a Dwelling house Standing on the Bank or Commonage Next the North End of Nanaquaket pond, as also one right and Three quarters of a Right in the Commons and Beeches lying along shore from Sineflesh River so called 'till it comes to the Ministrie Lott, but as there is no fixed part of said Commons & Beeches for to give this said Right & Three quarters proper boundaries, & Your Petitioner having no right to any other land in Said Town, To erect so much as a Garden, or yard to plant Greens or any kind of Sance, Is un- der Necessity to erect a spot or two for that use on the beech or be forced to hire, And as it cant be done without as much cost as perhaps the thing will be worth when done, Nevertheless inasmuch as it will also better accommodate round the said house for going in and out, or round the low part
894
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
thereof. Yo'r. Petit'r seems to be under necessity of doing it, as he may find himself able, & being Loth to Risque so much cost with the honse and all on any after division of said Com- monage, & a Draught for Rights where they shall Ly, as may be the case, Tho't. it the best security if this said meeting of the proprietors, Could in any wise See fit to grant that the Right & Three quarters purchased by Yo'r Petition'r & his Son be fixed & Determined to be where the said house stands. & ex- tending each way therefrom Untill it may Contain ye said Right & Three quarters and Yo'r Petition'r. as in duty bound shall ever return you thanks.
"BENJAMIN SHIELDEN."
The indefiniteness of the eastern and northern bounds of the great Pocasset property gave occasion very soon for controver- sies with their neighbors on both those borders.
"At a meeting of the Purchasers of Pocasset & Places adja- cent, Feb'r. the 20th 1682 3 at near Puncatest, The Pocasset Proprietors have chosen Christopher Almy & Nathan- iel Thomas to settle the bounds between the freemen lands & the said Purchasers lands & also between the township of Dart- mouth and the sd Purchasers lands either by composition with the said freemen or Town or their agents otherwise cause the lines between the Said lands to be Run according to
Their neighbors on the north were the people of Freetown, or the proprietors of the Freemen's purchase. With them, in the year 1700, a settlement of the dispute was agreed to, and each town appointed three surveyors to run the boundary line and establish the bounds. Tiverton appointed Richard Borden, Christopher Almy and Samnel Little, who, with three men of Freetown, reported a line on the first of November, 1700. The Fall river, near its month, was made the boundary, and this continued to be the town line so long as Freetown belonged to Massachusetts.
The next fifty years seem to have brought their share of trouble. The generous purposes of the first proprietors to re- serve some lands for the ministers gave rise to some practical problems unforeseen, which their sons had occasion to settle.
"June 15th 1749. Then met according to ajournment and Received a Report from Job Almy & Joseph Almy Esqs, our agents that they had procured an attorney to assist them when they should have Occation to Imploy him- So having proceeded
895
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
no further in any thing as yet this meeting is ajourned to Thursday ye ninth Day of November Next at ye Dwelling House of Nathaniel Littles at ten oclock in the forenoon on sd. Day-"
"November ye Ninth 1749 Then met according to ajourn- ment and are informed by Joseph Anthony Esq that he hath lately been sued for a certain tract of land in his possession by one Othniel Campbell who calls himself a Settled Minister of the Congregational Church in the town of Tiverton. and bath the aforesaid land in that capacity as appears by a Writt pro- duced by sd. Anthony at this meeting where upon this meeting is Adjourned to Monday ye thirteenth Day of this Instant at two oClock in ye afternoon (to consider and advise thereon) at ye House of Nathaniel Little in Tiverton."
Invested with authority, as the Proprietors were, over a do- main rapidly increasing in vale, their clerk, who was practi- cally their chief executive officer, became a man of importance in the community. On the 11th of April, 1861, "Also the said Proprietors have chosen Nathaniel Thomas, Clerke, to Record the bounds of their lots & other matter and to keep their Records & writings untill another Clerk be chosen and sworn."
Mr. Thomas' successors were Robert Woodman, who was chosen in 1716; Samuel Fordman, 1733; Abraham Barker, 1748; Pardon Gray, 1775; Abraham Barker, 1839. Mr. Barker, who died in 1855, was the last clerk ever chosen. He recorded sev- eral adjournments of meetings, at which no other business was done, and finally, "The clerk attended at the time appointed March 6 1848, there being but one other Proprietor present it was concluded to adjourn this meeting to meet at the Town Hall in Tiverton at One Oclock P. M. March 5th 1849 the time for our next annual meeting."
THE PROPRIETORS OF PUNCATEST. - When the settlement was made in 1680 in the north of Tiverton, the southern portion of the town was known as Puncatest. The name alluded to that tribe whose title the white men acquired by purchase, and applied to that portion of the town south of the Pocasset purchase, already mentioned. The date of the purchase is not made to appear in the Puncatest Proprietors' records, but it may be of interest to notice that three of the eight grantees in the grand deed of Pocasset are named in 1679-80 as Benjamin
896
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
Church, Daniel Wilcox and William Manchester of Puncatest. In the Puncatest. records, still carefully preserved by the heirs of the late Holder N. Wilcox, the last clerk, the terms "Pur- chasers of Pocasset" and "Proprietors of Puncatest" are rigidly adhered to in every reference to the two communities. Careful comparisons of conflicting family traditions have no more than created grounds for a possibility that the first set- tlement in the town was here as early as 1673.
The first survey of the Puncatest purchase is recorded as hav- ing been made April 20th, 1680, when William Crow and others measured and bounded thirty-seven lots, some of which are described as having been engaged to be laid out formerly by the proprietors. This survey is recorded by Nathaniel Thomas, who was chosen clerk for the proprietors, February 20th, 1682-3 :
" At a meeting of Purchasers of Pocasset lands & Proprie- tors of Puncatest lands at the house of Daniel Willcock in Reference to a final settlement of all former Contests Con- cerning the bounds between the lands of the s'd Purchasers of Pocasset & proprietors of Puncatest, the s'd Purchasers and Proprietors have unanimously agreed as followeth-that is to say: * *
The south line of Edward Gray's lot referred to as number thirty of the Pocasset purchase was agreed upon as the northern bonnds of the Puncatest lands. The meadow at Sa- powet seems to have been claimed by the Pocassest people, hence it is recorded:
"-& forasmuch as it doth appear to the s'd Purchasers & Proprietors that Puncatest proprietors could not groundedly clame so much land to belong to them by virtue of former Pur- chases from the Indians as is comprehended within
boundaries. It is therefore agreed that all and Every proprie- tor in Puncatest land that is not a first purchaser in the grand deed in s'd .Pocasset land shall pay the just sum of four pounds in for every single share that such Puncatest pro- prietor shall justly claim within the above bounded land."
Daniel Willcock was appointed to receive the monies thus to be paid. The territory added by this agreement to what was conceded to belong to the original Puncatest purchasers was called the "Out-lots." On the 24th of February, 1682-3, these out-lots were laid out and bounded, and the records show that
897
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
the lots were then owned or claimed by: Edward Gray, Christo pher Almy, Nathaniel Thomas, Job Almy, William Man- chester, Daniel Willcock, William Bradford, Thomas Waite, Thomas Clark, John Cook, Benjamin Church, John Williams and William Brown. July 25th, 1694, a meeting was held at the home of Edward Gray, and the purchasers of the lands be- tween the Puncatest lands and the Dartmouth bounds, ordered that "the s'd lands shall be surveyed and divided into Thirty shares or lotts as equally for quantity and quality leaving sufficient and common out-ways from place to place as they shall see needful."
This was done in December, and on the 15th of January the proprietors met at the same place and drew for the ownership of the thirty lots. The consecutively numbered lots 1 to 30, fell to the following persons: Nathaniel Thomas, 1, 5, 7, 13, 25; Job Almy, 2, 20, 23; Lydia Gray, 3; Seth Arnold, 4; Samuel Gray, 8; William Manchester, 9, 19, 21; Daniel Willcock, 10, 15; John Cook, 11, 18; Christopher Almy, 12, 14, 28, 30; Ben- jamin Church, 16; Ephra Cole, 17; Thomas Waite, 22; Samuel Little, 24; Nathaniel Southworth, 26; Jolin Cole, 27; Thomas Gray, 29. These seventeen persons included the original eight purchasers of Pocasset, one other who drew a great lot there, and eight whose names appear for the first time in this allot- ment.
The landmarks noted by the surveyor-the cedar bush, the oak shrub, the leaning pine-have passed. The marsh is no longer undrained, and is now the meadow. Here and there a large rock with no mark or definite record to distinguish it from a hundred more are remaining as the only boundary marks, save the patient old clerk's entry in the raw-hide covered book, so full of valne then, so full of interest and worm-holes to-day.
The entries of land evidence are similar in form to those quoted from the Pocasset records. The subject matter of the following quotations is of historic interest, and the orthogra- phy, capitalization and form are retained as showing the scholar- ship of that period.
" Feby 24 1682-3
"Imprimis .- we laid a highway from the highway across Capt Church's land begining at the mill dam, we laid it four rod wide & to run from the sd dam to the way that is ordered
898
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
by Pocasset Purchasers across their great lots to the fall River"
" Also at forty rods north from Capt Churches land we laid a way from the way that goeth out of Punkatest east into the woods as hye as the lots run of six rod wide"
"Also At the head of Punkatest Pond all the land lying between Capt Churches land & the highway which runs toward Pocasset & the highway that runs from Punkatest east into the woods was ordered to ly comon that cattle might have room enough to come to the brook & Pond in time of Drouth Per- petually"
Other highways and commons were provided for in similar manner, and on the 4th of May following the record was made to explain a prior understanding regarding rights of way:
"Imprimis .- It was agreed & ordered by the layers out of the lands & meadows before the lots were drawn That it should be allowed to every owner of any of the meadow lands to carry off his hay from his meadow over any other mans meadow where he had no other way to his own meadow soe as he doe it in such manner as may lest prejidise his neighbours meadow or grass"
From some of the votes it appears, after the division of the lands into farms and lots, title to some part of the reserved commons might be given to individual purchasers, the sums paid being divided among those who were original proprietors. Not only was the bargain a curiosity, but the record of these sales of the public lands is quaintly interesting. In July, 1710, Job Almy was given title to a roadway:
" And also that way that Runneth from fogland Spring to puncatest Creek to be drift ways to him & his heirs & assigns forever & he is to keepe goats & bars suffitiont for to pas & repas as in other Drift, ways. In Consideration pay Six pounds unto the clerk for the use of us the proprietors, he the s'd Almy to draw back out of the six pounds his part."
" Voted-That Will Almy Shall have About half the Land at the Spring Called the Spring Comon, or Comon About the Spring in puncatest Neck to him & his heirs & assigns forever *
* the sum of fifty-five shillings for the use of the pro- prietors and he to Expect no Draw back."
The year 1710 was one of great business activity at Puncatest. The position and direction of their south line dividing them from Seconnet was in controversy.
The thirty great lots were each more than two miles in length
899
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
and thirty rods wide. The dividing lines depended upon the first course, and no point of compass was mentioned in the or- iginal survey. It is therefore strange that not until February, 1729-30, do we find application was " made to Thomas Church, Esq., one of his Maj's Justicis of ye peace, by sixteen of the proprietors in Puncatest," for settlement by the courts of ques- tions involving every boundary in the "Propriete." The bound- ary line between Puncatest and Seconnet was the key to the whole question. The court of Plymouth appointed a commit- tee to locate this line, but before the 10th of May, 1732, the proprietors on both sides of the line discovered that no certain point of compass was mentioned in that committee's return; so Job Almy and Thomas Manchester for the Tiverton proprietors and Sylvester Richmond, Joseph Sonthworth and Thomas Da- venport for the Little Compton proprietors mutually chose" Joseph Mason, a surveyor, and from Seconnet river a line was established and recorded as binding all the parties, and thus the " Great lots lying east of Puncatest and home to Dartmouth line" were bounded on the sonth and between each other by courses "East 7ยบ North."
The choice of Nathaniel Thomas as the first clerk of the Pun- catest proprietors provided for the faithful discharge of the duties of that office until his successor should be chosen and sworn. The reader will notice the discrepancy in the two rec- ords-a discrepancy which suggests that the relation between the two great proprietorships in Tiverton was not understood at first to be what it finally became. The proprietors of Punca- test elected his successor, so far as their interests were concerned, in the person of John Woodman, at a meeting held at the house of Daniel Howland, April 7th, 1697, at which time and place he was sworn by Joseph Church, then residing in Little Compton, who appears to have then been another of " His Majesty's Jus- tices of ye peace." Restcome Sanford was chosen clerk in 1749 and Edward Gray in 1771. Mr. Gray signed the records as mod- erator of the meetings. Joseph Almy recorded the one meet- ing in 1776, and was chosen clerk in 1780, "Edward Gray be- ing dead." Redford Dennis, chosen in 1794, Joseph Bailey, 1806, and Pardon Gray, 1816, complete the list of clerks who maintained the succession until January 6th, 1817. From that time until 1873 no meeting was held and no entry made in the record save a meeting held at the town hall in June, 1859.
57
900
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
The effort of the few who, on May 31st, 1873, attempted to revive the meetings of the proprietors of Puncatest, claiming for themselves the rights their grandsires might one day have had, was not crowned with that degree of success which sincer- ity is thought to merit. The pine bush, the marked sapling, the stake and stones of 1680 were as far from their reach as were the men who marked them, and even the shore of the restless Seconnet was not where it once had been. They knew all these were lost; they more than half believed the records were gone with them; yet they chose as proprietors' clerk Holder N. Wil- cox, at whose honse they were met, and resolved that he be a "committee to get the Proprietors' Records if they can be found." On the 6th of September following, they voted him authority to "demand all the records and papers belonging to the proprietors, of the heirs of Abraham Barker, deceased, late Proprietors' Clerk of Tiverton." No doubt their vote gave him the anthority to demand. Fourteen years later the writer ob- tained more records and papers of the proprietors of Pocasset, from the heirs of Abraham Barker, than Holder N. Wilcox, the last clerk of the Puncatest proprietors, lived to read.
The experiences of the Tiverton pioneers were not essentially unlike those so nearly general among the New England settle- ments when the well kept treaty of the royal Massasoit was broken by the radical advisers of Philip, his youngest son and second successor. The white men had made no permanent homes here when the territory was embraced in the scene of the first act of that great drama in which Philip, the king of the Wampanoags, so ably, and Colonel Church of Seconnet, so successfully, played their parts.
Six days after the cloud of war had burst, and Swansea was in ashes, Philip crossed, on the 30th of June, 1675, from Mount Hope to what is now Tiverton, and with six hundred men withstood for eighteen days the attacks of the organized Eng- lish. Colonel Church was at the English garrison on Mount Hope the first week in July, and with fifteen men crossed to Tiverton, following the then fugitive Philip. On the 8th he struck their trail, leading southward to Fogland. This trail was along the general course of the great west road as it now leads from the stone bridge to Seconnet point. At Fog- land, a point in the sonthwest of Tiverton, extending west- ward to narrow the Seconnet, Church's company was attacked
901
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
by twenty times their number, and after six hours of manom- vering, during which none of the whites were killed, they were extricated from their dilemma by Captain Golding, who ran down the river with his sloop from his little island below the stone bridge and reseued his friends, taking them up the river and landing them at the foot of Mount Hope. His island is variously known as Golding's island, Gold island, or, in the later corruption of the word, as Gould island. This skirmish has been dignified in Arnold's History of Rhode Island by the title of the "Battle of Fogland."
The reader who noticed that white men were residents of Pancatest when the grand deed of Pocasset was executed in 1680, may find light on an interesting topic by consulting the authori- ties, who say this skirmish of the 8th of July, 1675, was in a cultivated field belonging to Captain Almy. The traditions of this family, as preserved by its present representatives here, do not confirm so early a date. However that may be, surely the English were driven off the territory, and Philip, gathering his warriors, repaired to the northward, and for ten days on the defensive, he and Wetamoo, his brother's widow, awaited in the village of the Pocassets the arrival of the English.
Their coming, on the afternoon of July 18th, was the signal for slaughter to begin. The English entered the swamp and were shot down as rapidly as they advanced, but their numer- ical advantage could not be overcome and the Indians were driven from their ambuscades with fearful loss. Darkness fell upon the scene; the English were unwilling to risk the issue to the chances of the night and withdrew, but Philip was unwil- ling to risk the issues of the day to come, and accordingly, with Wetamoo and the ablest of their warriors, they crossed Taun- ton river under cover of the night and made their escape to the country of the Nipmucks in central Massachusetts. They killed sixteen of the whites and in their flight left their hundred wig- wans and a hundred of their own number to fall into the hands of the English. This event, one of no slight importance in the King Philip war, took place sonth of the present northern boundary of Tiverton, in a cedar swamp east of the Fish road and west of the outlet of Stafford pond. It is cited variously as the battle of Tiverton, the Swamp fight and the battle of Pocasset.
These two engagements and the murder of Zoeth Howland
902
HISTORY OF NEWPORT COUNTY.
(55), are the principal events in the King Philip war occurring in Tiverton. This Zoeth Howland, the father of Daniel Howland, mentioned as owning the ferry, was killed by the Indians near the present residence of John S. West, on the 21st of March, 1676. The most shocking barbarities were practiced upon the body, and the tradition is that the stream now known as Snell brook, emptying into the bay south of the stone bridge, re- ceived the name it so long bore-Sin and Flesh river-from be- ing the place where they finally disposed of their victim.
TIVERTON AS A TOWN .-- When the territory of Tiverton, being then included in Bristol county, became, in 1691, a part of Massachusetts, it was still known by the Indian name of Pocasset. In some of the court orders for the government of the settlement prior to this time, and while under the jurisdic- tion of Plymouth, the term " settlements at Pocasset and places adjacent" occurs, by which it seems the intention to include the southern settlement at Puncatest.
The colony of Massachusetts, in 1692, erected into towns the newly acquired region, and the town of Tiverton was incorpor- ated on the 2d of March, 1692. On that date, in the order of the court creating the town as a body politic, twenty-seven men were declared freemen of the town, and upon them were placed the responsibilities as well as the privileges of freemen ; for it must be kept in mind that votes then were not worth as much as they have been in modern times, and a desire for holding of- lice was not yet instilled into their minds as an open or secret ambition. The twenty-seven were : Major Church, John Pearce, John Cook, Gersham Woodle, Richard Borden, Christopher Almy, Thomas Cory, Stephen Manchester, Joseph Anthony, Job Manchester, Joseph Wanton, Forbes Manchester, Daniel Ilowland, Edward Gray, Edward Briggs, William Manchester, Amos Sheffield, Daniel Willcock [Wilcox], Edward Colby, Joseph Tabor, David Lake, Thomas Waite, Joseph Tallman, John Briggs, John Cooke, William Almy and John Cook, Jr.
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