USA > Vermont > Lamoille County > Johnson > History of the town of Johnson, Vt. 1784-1904 > Part 1
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Gc 974.302 1630
Gc 974. 302 J630 1136499
M. L.
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01100 2950
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015
https://archive.org/details/historyoftownofj1784orea
490
Mattio &. Baker.
(First President of the Oread Club, and Chairman of the Committee in charge of the Compilation of the Johnson History.)
HISTORY -
OF THE TOWN OF
JOHNSON, VT.
1784 - 1907.
COMPILED AND PUBLISHED
UNDER DIRECTION OF THE
OREAD LITERARY CLUB
FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE
JOHNSON PUBLIC LIBRARY FUND. 1907.
BURLINGTON : FREE PRESS PRINTING CO., PRINTERS, BINDERS, STATIONERS. 1907.
COPYRIGHT 1907, MATTIE W. BAKER.
Johnson Village is 460 feet above sea-level.
At the first census, taken in 1791, the inhabitants of the town num- bered 93.
Population by decades :
1136499
1800.
255
1810
494
1820.
778
1830
1079
1840
1410
1850
138I
I860
1526
1870 1558
I880
. 1495
1890.
1462
1900
1391
to Cambridge
Chas.Scott
Paul T. Sweet
Lease Gordon
Buzzell
Abner Andrews
Old Hart Factory Pent Road
L John Chessmore
Chessmore Shoe Shop
Oliver Allen Hotel->
Ormsbee
Bam
Cornelius Lynde
Merriam
Samuel
Mr. Sweet
Beardsley
Moses Morse
Merriam &·
Lynde Store
Rev.E.Jones
Jones.
Tenement
and Chair Shop
Dwelling
Hosmer
Barn
J. M. Hotchkiss Store- Judson Rowell's Store S.S.Pike-+
Joseph Poland
IFMurphy
Morgan Rock Old Fied) Sh
Grist
Shop
Mrs.Gilman
Geo. W. Hill
Andrew Dow
L.O. Stevens
Baptist Church
Academy
Cold Spring ...
Cemetery
Tannery
Waterman
Azariah
Justus Dodge to Perkinsville
Marshall Hosmer
A.W.Caldwell
to Hydepark
Pent Road to -Burnham Hill
Map of Johnson Village
Cong. Church --- >
James Clark->
Old Red Schoolhouse
Tenement
Andrew Dow's Woolen.
Mill
are
Dam
Factory
Blake
Mill House
Mrs.Sheldon
A. Young ..
J.Walker ---
Calvin Smith-
H. W. Robinson -...
Starch Factor
Azariah
to Parter Carpenter's
Coldwell's Furniture Shop-
in the Early
'40' S.
to French Hill -
Munt
Samuel Morgom Hat Shop and Dwelling
Doane
Blacksmith Shops-
Paul T.Sweet Tinshop
·Cabinet;
Reed
Levi
Moses Morse
Store
GIHON RIVER
Thomas Waterman
Nathan
Hotel
J.B.Downer Post Office
Salmon Wires
Joseph Waterman
"Shop "
Jaseph®
LAMOILLE
Tenement
RIVER:
Saw Mill
CHAPTER 1.
-
HISTORY OF THE TOWN.
This township, containing 23,040 acres, was first granted to a man by the name of Joseph Brown, who was one of the first three settlers of the town of Jericho, some time previous to the year 1780. He caused the outlines to be surveyed, commenced the allotment in the eastern part of the town, and gave it the name of Brownington.
In the fall of 1780, while Mr. Brown was at his home in Jericho with his family, which consisted of his wife, two sons and a daughter, a party of Indians on their return to Canada after sacking the village of Royalton, came to Mr. Brown's clearing, burned his log cabin and barns, killed his cattle, and carried off the family as prisoners of war, this being in Revolutionary times. They suffered much from fatigue and hunger on their long, rough tramp to Canada, their principal food being raw bear's meat.
On arriving at St. John's, they were turned over to the British au- thorities, their captors receiving the bounty due them, $8.00 per head. For more than three years they were kept there at hard labor, with scanty fare and great privations. They did not hear of the peace till some time after its establishment, so it was three years and eight months before they returned to the settlement.
During this time, the fees for the grant of the charter remained un- paid, and the Government officials not knowing of Brown's misfortunes, concluded he must be dead, so another grant of the township was made to Samuel William Johnson and his associates on Feb. 27, 1782. The charter of the town was not obtained till Jan. 2, 1792, when it was
6
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
issued by the Governor of Vermont, bearing the name of the grantee, Johnson. The name of Brownington stuck to the township till 1787, for in the "Diary of Jabez Fitch" under the head "Hydepark," in Miss Hemenway's "Gazetteer of Vermont," he speaks of this township al- ways as Brownington, and of stopping here at McConnell's and Smith's, two of the early settlers, as he went back and forth from Hydepark to Cambridge, that year.
Fitch returned to Connecticut, and came back the next year, and then his diary makes mention of this town as Johnson.
Previous to the survey and allotment of the town by Johnson, in 1788 or '89, a number of settlements were made on the borders of the Lamoille river by emigrants from New Hampshire and perhaps other places. The first one was made in 1784, by Mr. Samuel Eaton of Pier- mont, N. H., whose name is recorded among the heroes of the Revolu- tion, and he also served in the French and Indian war, during which he passed through this part of the country and down the Lamoille as a scout. At the commencement of the Revolution he enlisted in the American army under Col. Beedle, and frequently passed through this township while scouting between the Connecticut river and Lake Cham- plain. Several times he camped on the same flat which he af- terwards occupied as a farm, it having impressed him as a favorable site for a home. It is the meadow of what has been known for many years as the Holmes farm, on the Waterville road.
He removed to this spot from the Connecticut river, with a large fam- ily, carrying his whole worldly possessions on a pack-horse. The dis- tance was more than sixty miles, principally through an unbroken wilderness ; and for more than thirty miles he was guided only by trees which he and his companions had previously blazed while on scouting parties in war-time, opening a path as he passed along.
Like all the earlier settlers, he was largely dependent upon hunting and fishing to support his family, until he could raise vegetables and
7
OF JOHNSON, VERMONT
grain. English turnips were raised as soon as a bit of land could be cleared, even planted around stumps of trees. These turnips took the place of potatoes. Later, potatoes were raised, but they were scarce for a long time, partly from the lack of seed. Moose and other native animals ranged upon the hills and mountains and there were plenty of fish in the streams. Bread, however, was a rarity when obtained, hav- ing to be procured at a great distance, in flour or meal, and carried in sacks, upon the shoulders of the pioneers, to their families in their rude and lonely cabins.
Mr. Eaton lived to a good old age much respected, and in his later years received a pension from Government for Revolutionary services. He was buried in the cemetery near Eugene Grow's, in what was then the town of Sterling. In 1904 the town of Johnson voted to place a monument at his grave. It is a heavy block of Vermont granite on which is this inscription :
"Samuel Eaton 1742-1826.
Soldier of the Revolution, First Settler of the Town of Johnson, 1784. Erected by the Town of Johnson, 1904."
Two women of the third and fourth generation in direct descent from Mr. Eaton are still living in town, Mrs. Thomas Bettis, and Mrs. David Muzzy.
The year following Mr. Eaton's settlement here, a number of his old neighbors in New Hampshire followed him. Among them were two brothers named McConnell, one of whom located at the falls where the
8
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
present mill-dam is, and erected a saw-mill and grist-mill. Among these early settlers were the Millers, McDaniels, Mills, Simons, Smiths and Greggs. The first marriage in Johnson was John Simons to Sally Mills in 1791 or '92.
The first deed on record was given the 7th day of Feb. 1788, land being deeded by several of the original proprietors" to Jona. Edwards of New Haven, Conn., in Consideration of Ten Pounds Lawful money Rec'd To our Full satisfaction, and for Divour's other Causes."
The first child born in town was a son of Mr. Aaron Smith, and was named Johnson Smith, in honor of the town. The mother, when the child was but a few months old, in view of approaching winter and the scarcity of provisions, started with her child, accompanied by her hus- band, for Onion river, and thence, on foot and alone, traveled to Ben- nington to spend the winter with friends.
The first death in town was that of John Fullington, who was the first white man to settle in the town of Fletcher. It was in the autumn of 1785. He came from Deerfield, N. H., commenced clearing a farm, put up a shanty, worked one season, and, returning to Deerfield, started with his wife and four little children for their new home. They had one horse to ride, and one cow to drive, and only marked trees to guide them on their way. "Two men by the name of Barnett who had land in Fairfax, came with them. Coming through Johnson they stopped for the night at the house of Thomas McConnell, who had a patch of tur- nips, and Mr. Fullington ate one raw ; a severe attack of colic followed from which he died before morning. He was buried the next day in a trough dug out of a bass-wood log. The grave was a few rods northeast of where the Foote house now stands. A large rock near by marks the spot.
The widow and children went on to the desolate cabin home in Fletcher. She lived to be ninety-five years old, and died of small-pox.
9
OF JOHNSON, VERMONT
The allotment of the town was made in 1788 or '89. The lots were designed to contain 300 acres to each proprietor, besides an allowance of five per cent. for roads. The survey, however, was very inaccurate, some lots containing a much larger number of acres than others, and zigzag lines were found to run from corner to corner of lots, enlarging one by diminishing another. All this caused much dispute and litiga- gation among the early settlers, but in all cases the courts established the lines and corners where they could be proven to have been run and marked.
The settlers cleared the land, planted corn, and built log houses without doors or windows, hanging quilts at, the door-ways. These houses were scantily furnished, as most of the settlers came from long distances, and, from lack of transportation, could bring but little with them.
One of those who came here previous to 1790 was a young man from Boston by the name of John Wier, who had previously been a sailor, but, strangely enough left that occupation to come to the wilds of Northern Vermont. He arrived in his short jacket and buff trousers, destitute of means even to procure an axe to commence labor in the forest, but selecting a location in the northern part of the town, he built a cabin, where he lived like a hermit until with industry and economy he had paid for his land, cleared and stocked his farm. In 1801 he sold it and set up a store in what afterward became the village, dealing principally in groceries. He also manufactured pot and pearl ashes, by which industry he gained considerable means. He was a man of limited education and depended upon memory rather than accounts in his mercantile transactions. Being strictly honest himself, he thought other people were the same, and thus much of his goods passed into the hands of those who either could not, or would not pay for them. His place of business was what was known later as the "old red store," which stood about where the hose house now stands.
10
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
After his death, which occurred sometime in the '30's, there was discovered among some rubbish, an old stocking well filled with silver coin and some forty dollars in bills, which appeared to have been wrapped in paper, of which the mice had made a comfortable nest.
He was buried in the cemetery on Stearns St., and this inscription was placed upon his tombstone:
"An honest man is the noblest work of God."
At the first census of the town, in 1791, the population was 93. The taxable property was valued at £275, equal to $1,375.
From 1790 to 1800 more settlers arrived, mostly from New Hamp- shire and Massachusetts. From New Boston and Amherst, N. H., came the families of Balch, Wilson, Ellinwood, Reddington, Prime, At- well and others. Mrs. Atwell came on horseback all the way, carrying with her a flax-wheel. She started with a mirror also, but that was un- fortunately dropped on the way, and broken. They located on what has ever since been known as the Atwell farm, on the hill-road to Wa- terville, and when her horse waded what is now known as the Manning brook, she was the first white woman to cross it. Their first home was a log cabin, replaced later by a better structure, and the present brick house, built in 1828, was the fourth home which they erected.
For years they endured all sorts of privations and hardships, in common with the other settlers, but reared a large family of children in spite of them. It required the "three P's, Patience, Perseverance and Pluck," to be a pioneer woman in those days, and Mrs. Atwell once drove off with a pitchfork, in the absence of men-folks, a hungry bear who was disposed to make a meal of some precious little pigs.
Wild animals were, of course, very common, and even twenty years later were by no means rare. When Perkins Langdell, who came here a boy of seven, in 1818, was hoeing corn as a youth, he was near a log fence, and, hearing a noise, looked up to see a bear standing be-
DANIEL DODGE
MRS. DANIEL DODGE
MRS. HANNAH BALCH BAKER 1770-1867
THOMAS BAKER 1800-1863
11
OF JOHNSON, VERMONT
hind the fence, his fore-paws resting on it, as if debating whether it were worth while to vault over and make a dinner of the boy.
The journey to this part of the country by team from southern New Hampshire, from Massachusetts and Connecticut, whence most of the settlers emigrated, was more of an undertaking than is a journey to Alaska now. Both people and household stuff usually came by sleds, the wear and tear on both loads and teams being less. They had to be out several nights on the way, for roads were poor and travel very slow. When Mr. Daniel Dodge moved here from New Boston, N. H., at one place where he and his wife spent the night, the house was burned and they suffered loss as well as the family, he losing his cap and pocketbook, and she her hood. Some good Samaritan woman fur- nished a hood for her to complete her journey in, but she inwardly felt that it was a poor substitute for the smart hood in which she had ex- pected to appear in the new country where she was going.
From Belchertown and other places in Massachusetts and Connec- ticut came the Ferrys, Clarks, Wheelers and others. The first physician in town was Dr. William Coit. The first merchant was a man by the name of Crosby, who erected a small plank store. He had for sale a puncheon of potato whiskey highly colored with hemlock bark and burnt sugar, which he called French brandy, and asked a price accord- ingly. Some thirsty individuals secretly contrived to bore through the plank into the end of the puncheon and put in a faucet from the out- side, which was hidden by a large log lying near the building, and there they took their nightly drinks at leisure. The trick was not discovered until the puncheon was nearly empty, when Mr. Crosby tried to move it, and found it fastened to the wall.
The population of the town in 1800 was 255.
Between 1800 and 1805 more settlers came from New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut and from other places in Vermont, in- cluding the families of Griswold, Burnham, Morgan, Ober, Perkins,
12
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
Patch, Waters and Nichols. The family of Arunah Waterman came here from Norwich, Conn., with an ox team, being seventeen days on the road. He was one of the original proprietors of the town of Hyde- park, but shortly after arriving there he purchased the farm in John- son where Jonathan McConnell had located, and built the mills already referred to, about which the village has since grown up. His house stood near the site of the store built by O. & A. H. Buck on the north side of the Gihon, beside the bridge, now occupied by H. M. Maxfield, but was farther away from the Gihon. Mr. Waterman lived there till his death in 1838 in the 90th year of his age.
The first mail was carried through town by John Skeels of Peacham on horseback to St. Albans and back once a week. Arunah Waterman, Jr., was the first postmaster. The first settled minister was Elder Joel P. Hayford, a young Baptist, and he lived in the house near the north end of Pearl St. long owned by Roswell Bradley.
The earliest settlers located near the streams, clearing the meadows for farms. Later comers chose land on the hills in preference, for one reason, because they feared floods on the meadows, and did not realize that flooding enriched the land. But a more cogent reason was that it was found that the hill-lands raised better crops of wheat, sometimes as high as 36 bushels to the acre. There was no unlimited "Out West" to raise wheat for New England in those days, and it behooved the settlers to raise everything possible in the way of food.
The geographical center of the township as it was then bounded, was where Nathan Dodge lives. That part of the town was called the "Plot," in recognition of the plotting together of some of the original proprietors to have their lots measured off larger than was usual. The village was naturally enough called the "Flat." The men of substance in the north part of the town like the Dodges, Balches and others, thought that the commercial center of the town ought to coincide with the geographical, and tried to have a village built there. Alexander
13
OF JOHNSON, VERMONT
Gregg built a store on the flat below the farm buildings so long owned by Benjamin Morgan, and now by Frank Dodge, and he traded there for several years. The cellar on the site of this store, where barrels of whiskey and New England rum were as common as those of mo- lasses, is still plainly to be seen.
Later on, when cattle and horses became common enough so there were occasional strays, the town pound was established at this place, the man occupying the house being pound-keeper. All stray animals were driven there and kept till the rightful owner came and released them by paying the pound fee.
Another little settlement was started farther east. When John Cristy came to town from New Boston, N. H., in 1827, and bought the farm where he lived the rest of his life, there was a store, potash-fac- tory, blacksmith shop and chair factory located on the farm. Joshua Chase was the blacksmith, Cutler Crosman, the merchant, and Matthew Griswold owned and managed the chair factory. The chair-posts, rails and rounds were turned by machinery, the bottoms were basket- weaving. Many of the chairs are still in existence.
With so many people settling on the hills, it was only natural that roads should be built over them, but hill-roads seemed to have no terrors for our forefathers. Up-hill and down-dale was all one to them. They appeared to take a bee-line, as nearly as possible, for the objective point, and if a steep hill stood in the way, over the hill went the road, all the same. Perhaps they forgot that the bail of a kettle is no longer when lying down around the edge, than when standing up over the center.
There are mossy side-hill pastures in some parts of the town, where can still be traced the old stage-roads which were laid out and traveled in those early days. Who were the dwellers along these roads?
In the northern part of the town, away in what we now call the back pastures, berry-pickers will come upon what was once a traveled highway leading to some hollow among the hills, where a cup-like de-
14
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
pression in the ground, with gnarled old apple trees around it, tells that here was once a home where human hopes and human loves flourished and were recognized. But perhaps no one of this generation can tell whose was this home of long ago.
"The homely hearth of honest mirth; The traces of their plough, The places of their worshipping Are all forgotten now."
Among the first saw-mills built was one on the Thomas Hooper farm, lately owned by James Parker. The raising of the frame for this mill was made memorable by a serious accident. A young man, twenty years of age, named Farr, who had been married only two or three days, fell from the top on to the rocks below, and was so seriously injured that his reasoning powers were entirely dethroned. From that time until his death, at ninety years of age, he remained perfectly helpless and speech- less, his faithful and devoted wife supporting and caring for him all these years.
The farmers cleared the land as fast as possible, rolled the logs to- gether and burned them, using the ashes for potash and pearlash, there being of course no market for lumber except for their own use. Even as late as the middle of the last century, acres and acres of land were cleared of their noble trees in the same spendthrift fashion, leaving land rocky and useless for tillage purposes, that, had the trees been left standing, would be a veritable gold mine now.
The first general article of commerce was potash, or salts of lye. There was a potash factory still standing, within the last half century, on the meadow directly back of Dr. Minott's house on Railroad St. Here ashes were brought and sold for nine pence per bushel, and made into potash and pearlash for the market. The factory was owned by Moses Morse, and its products were sold in Montreal.
THOMAS WATERMAN
MRS. ELEANOR DODGE WATERMAN
ASA WATERMAN
MRS. ANNA DODGE WATERMAN
15
OF JOHNSON, VERMONT
Occasionally farmers burned hardwood in coal-pits, making char- coal to sell to the blacksmiths. Of all the trees in the forest, the maple was the most valuable to the early settlers. At a time when coal still lay hidden in the earth, its wood was the best fuel for their greedy fire places. They made sugar from maple sap in a crude fashion, cutting a gash in the tree with an axe, and inserting a thin chip which conducted the sap into some receptacle set on the ground underneath. They boiled the sap in large iron kettles, with a piece of salt pork hung on a hook just high enough to dip into the sap if it came near boiling over.
Those early-time people found it necessary to make their own lights. At first they dipped pieces of old cloth in grease or oil, such as they had, and burned it in an old saucer ; this was called a "slutlight." The mills and factories requiring a more brilliant light used refuse fats, without trying out, in a shallow, iron kettle, placing quite a large piece of cloth in the center of the kettle, bringing together, and tying, near the top, for a wick. Whale-oil was burned in small tin lamps by those who could afford it on extra occasions.
Of course tallow for candles was rare in early days, for the settlers could not spare any of their few cattle to be killed. Eleanor Dodge, (afterwards Mrs. Thomas Waterman) who came here from New Bos- ton, N. H., about 1800, to keep house for her brother, Elisha, before his marriage, used to tell of her first winter in town, when, by close economy she managed to get together enough tallow to run two candles in tin candle-moulds. Then Mrs. Atwell gave her three candles, and another good woman gave her two more, so she had seven, quite a good winter's stock. Nobody thought of such an extravagance as lighting a candle except in case of severe illness, or some great emergency. All meals were cooked at the big fire-place, supper was eaten and dishes washed by its cheerful light, and the family gathered around it for their evening's work, the women with sewing, knitting or spinning, while the men scraped axe-helves, tinkered farming tools, or tapped
16
HISTORY OF THE TOWN
their cowhide boots. The children lying on the floor where a hearth- rug would be now-a-days, spelled out their lessons for the next day in Webster's Elementary Spelling-book, or played "fox-and-geese" on a home-made board. There was corn to pop over the coals, and per- haps butternuts to crack, but the traditional pitcher of cider and dish of apples which would complete this picture of domestic comfort had to wait till the first settlers had set out apple-trees and waited for them to reach the bearing age.
The first manufacturing in town was purely domestic. Fields of flax with their dainty blue flowers became common, and in the fall it might have been seen cut and lying to rot the fiber in the sun and rain, then it was brought in and stored for winter's work. The wood-cut for February in Thompson's Farmer's Almanac was always that of a man swingling flax on a home-made break, a picture which the children of this twentieth century would not understand at all. Within doors the work of hetchelling, spinning and weaving the flax went busily on. They made all their underwear, bed and table linen and toweling. For handkerchiefs they would spin and weave a very fine piece of linen, then bleach it on the grass. They also made their thread. 1
If they wished for nicer cloth than any they could make, they bought it, often paying in barley, or other grain, as ready cash was scarce. It took sixty-four bushels of barley to buy a yard of broadcloth, and a bushel of wheat to purchase a yard of calico. They made linsey- woolsey cloth for dresses, the warp being linen and the filling wool. The colors were red, blue and copperas, woven in little checks. Some- times they tied peas in a piece of linen, woven for dresses, dyeing the goods blue, making a pretty little ring, for a figure. The women and girls braided straw and palmleaf, and sewed hats, also made husk doormats. They made soft soap by leaching wood ashes and boiling the lye with grease. There was no saleratus to be bought, so they made pearlash for cooking purposes. Cob coals made the very best
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