USA > Vermont > Essex County > Gazetteer of Caledonia and Essex Counties, Vt. 1764-1887 > Part 35
USA > Vermont > Caledonia County > Gazetteer of Caledonia and Essex Counties, Vt. 1764-1887 > Part 35
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In several histories we read that Ryegate was first settled in 1774. We will here give the names of persons who lived in Ryegate at the close of 1773, viz. : Aaron Hosmer, Daniel Hunt, John Hyndman, his wife, Janet, and their son, William Hyndman, then nearly three years old, James White- law, David Allen and James Henderson, eight in all. The first white child born here was Janet Hyndman, February 28, 1774. The second child was Isabel Brock, daughter of Walter Brock and Janet Stuart, his wife, born in the public house of the Scotch company, in 1775, and who afterwards be- came the wife of William, eldest son of John Hyndman. The third child
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was Margaret Hyndman, born December 24, 1775. The first male child was James Taylor, born in 1776, and the second male child was John Nel- son. The statement that " Hosmer had lived here for some time" when he was found in Ryegate, June 29, 1773, by Whitelaw and Allen, being an in- definite expression, the natural inference is that he was probably in Ryegate about 1772. Daniel Hunt came into town in the spring of 1773. John Hyndman came here with his family in the fall of 1773.
In May, 1774, the following members of the Scotch company arrived : David Ferry, Alexander Sym and wife and son Campbell, Andrew and Robert Brock, John and Robert Orr, John Wilson, John Gray, John Shaw, Jr., and Hugh Temple. The most of these emigrants, with Sym as leader, went to Newbury to work for Col. Bailey until the first of July, when they returned, each taking possession of his lot. On October Ist John Waddle, James Nelson and Thomas McKeith arrived, and October 7th Patrick Lang, Will- iam Neilson, Jean, his wife, and three children, William, Robert and Mary, and David Reid. On October 8th Robert Gammell, Robert Twaddle, and Andrew and James Smith arrived, the four last named not being of the orig- inal Scotch company.
David Allen, Whitelaw's companion and fellow commissioner, about the first of August, 1774, started for Scotland, where his family was, and tried for many years to arrange his business so as to get back to America ; but his leased farm held him until 1801, and when he got everything in readiness to leave his native land he was taken sick and died, and was buried the day the vessel started that was to bring him over. His son William, and daughter Margaret, went from the graveyard to the ship and came to Ryegate in June. His widow, with Mary and Elizabeth, came the next year.
On October 22, 1774, Andrew Smith was taken with colic and died in six- teen hours. This was the first death in Ryegate. He had been here only two weeks. He was buried in the Scotch cemetery, east of Town Hill. About January 1, 1775, James Whitelaw bought that part of lot 120 in New- bury that lies on the north side of Wells river, which contains the Great Falls, (now Boltonville) and soon after a grist and saw-mill was built on it. On February 1, 1775, Archibald Taylor and family, viz. : Mary, John, Jean and Archibald, arrived. In February, Jonathan Gates, a Yankee, then a boy of eight years, came to the town. John Scott, one of the company, came to America in 1773, and to Ryegate April 16, 1775. He lived here a few years and then went to Newbury. Walter Brock and his wife Janet, both of Glas- gow, Scotland, and four of his children, Janet, John, Jane and Claude, lived for a time, in 1775, in the block-house, built by the Scotch company on Town Hill. Janet Brock was afterwards Col. A. Harvey's wife, in Barnet. She was married at fourteen, and had sixteen children, and later on was General Whitelaw's third wife. A grandson of Walter, A. Harvey Brock, now lives in town. The above embraces the Scotch company prior to the Revolutionary war.
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Another vessel laden with emigrants sailed from Greenock, Scotland, in 1775, and got to Boston three weeks before the battle of Bunker Hill. They landed, but the British would not permit them to leave. Among them was Robert Hall and family, the great-grandfather of George L. Hall, now of South Ryegate. William, son of Robert, was pressed into the British army and fought at the battle of Bunker Hill. After nine months the family was moved by the British to Halifax, N. S. Robert, Jr., was six years old then, and twenty-two when he afterwards came to Ryegate. His brother, James Hall, came to town some two or three years later. William Tassey, who was one of the same company of emigrants, years afterwards came to Ryegate, stayed a short time, and then went to Groton and lived and died there. The three last mentioned are about the only ones of that company of emigrants who ever reached these parts.
After the close of the war numbers of emigrants began to arrive from Scot- land, an influx that was continued more or less down to the year 1850. Of the emigrants in 1784, were Alexander Miller and family, Hugh Gardner, James McKindley, William Craig and family, John Ritchie and family, Rob- ert Brock, Sr., and his wife Jean, John Shaw, Sr., and wife, and the family of John Waddle, Sr., comprising his wife, Rebecca, and seven children. He had been separated from them about ten years by the war.
The town was organized on the third Tuesday in May, 1776, when the fol- lowing officers were elected: John Gray and James Whitelaw, assessors ; An- drew Brock, treasurer ; Robert Twaddle and John Orr, highway surveyors ; Patrick Lang and John Shaw, overseers of the poor; John Scott, collector ; and Archibald Taylor, James Smith, William Neilson and David Reid, con- stables.
James Whitelaw, " the Father of Ryegate," was born February 11, 1748, at New Mills, Old Monkland Parish, Lanarkshire, Scotland. He was a land surveyor by occupation, and left Scotland in 1773, reaching Ryegate June 28th of that year. He again returned to the town November 11, 1773, and perma- nently remained here. The first surveyor-general of Vermont was Ira Allen, and Whitelaw was appointed, in 1783, as deputy surveyor by him. Whitelaw was chosen in October, 1787, surveyor-general of Vermont, and was annually elected to that office until November, 1805, more than eighteen years. He was the first town clerk, and, with the exception of a few years, held the office until his death. In 1800 he was appointed postmaster, which he continued to be until his death. For more than forty years his influence was felt in almost every movement in town. He married Abigail Johnston, of Newbury, in 1778, by whom he had two sons, Robert and William, and two daughters, who afterwards became Mrs. A. Henderson, of Ryegate, and Mrs. William Wallace, of Newbury, respectively. His first wife died July 15, 1790, in her thirty-first year, and he married for his second wife Susannah Rogers, of Brad- ford, November 23, 1790. She died March 26, 1815, aged sixty-nine years, and his third wife was Janet Brock, and was born in Scotland, October 10,
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1767. She afterwards became the wife and widow of Col. Alexander Harvey, of Barnet. In her family were sixteen children, a large proportion of whom became the most talented and able residents of the town or county. She died in 1854, aged eighty-eight years. Of General Whitelaw it is said : " He had always great care and government of his own words and actions; there was no pride or passion in his intercourse with mankind, but a wonderful serenity of mind and evenness of temper visible in his very countenance. Few men have been more beloved in life, or more lamented in death." He died April 29, 1829, aged eighty-one years.
John Gray was born at "Brig. of Johnstone," three miles west of Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland, in 1749. He came to Ryegate in May, 1774, on his arrival having but one shilling in his pocket. On June 13, 1777, he mar- ried Jean McFarland, a native of Buchanon parish, Starlingshire, Scotland, and born in 1747. She came to Ryegate with her parents, in 1775, and they subsequently went to Barnet, She was working for Mr. McKay, of Haverhill, at the time of her marriage. They had seven children, five of whom died in 1796 and '97, and among the last number was John Gray, Jr., who was born in Ryegate, in 1779, and died in Barnet, June 30, 1797, in his eighteenth year. He had been to Barnet Center to church, was taken sick, and died at McLaren's within twenty-four hours. He was buried in the Center cemetery, about two rods southeast of the Goodwille lot. Of the surviving children, Nancy, the oldest, married Robert Nelson, of Lyman, and reared a large family. William, the next to the youngest, also raised a large family. Capt. John Gray was the father of the Associate (now the United Presbyterian) church in Ryegate, and the first elder ever in town, an office which he held from its organization (in 1779) through life. He often held important and prominent town offices. During the Revolutionary war he was occasionally molested by the Tories and Indians, and also by two companies of Conti- nental soldiers who camped one summer on his farm. He was a man of energy and decision of character, generous and public spirited. He gained the confidence and esteem of all. He was a remarkably hard working and industrious man, and accumulated a large property. " He was," said one who knew him well, " the noblest work of God-an honest man." He died November 20, 1816, in the sixty-seventh year of his age. His old home, one of the finest in Ryegate, is now owned and occupied by James Nelson, who married his granddaughter in 1852.
Major James Witherspoon, the oldest son of Dr. Witherspoon, who was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, had a tract of 600 acres of land in the northwestern corner of Ryegate, and settled upon and cleared part of it when the war began. His father persuaded him to join the American army, which he did. He was commissioned as a Major, and was one of Gen- eral Washington's aids at the battle of Germantown, October 4, 1777, where he was killed. His land was the same that has been owned a long time since by the Whitehill families. Nearly everything has passed into oblivion respect-
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ing Major James Witherspoon. Rev. Thomas Goodwillie, in Miss Hemenway's history, while writing of Rev. John Witherspoon, D. D., states that he was a de- scendant of John Knox, the famous Scottish reformer, and president of Prince- ton college, in New Jersey, a member of Congress for six years, etc. "James, his eldest son, settled in the northern part of Ryegate, where he remained nearly two years, untill he joined the American army, etc." Major Witherspoon then must have come into Ryegate in 1775. February 15, 1787, Dr. Wither- spoon and wife deeded this tract to Rev. Alexander Simpson, of London, England, for £300 sterling. In the description, after giving the bounds and leading points, he states "together with all and singular, the houses, out- houses, barns, stables, orchards, fences, feedings, waters, water-courses, mines, minerals, profits, commodities, hereditaments and appurtenances whatsoever, and also all the estate, right, title, interest, property, claim and demand what- ever." This is merely to give a specimen of old style deeds. Catherine Boston, widow of Rev. Alexander Simpson, of the city of Glasgow, Scotland, sold this same tract to James and Abraham Whitehill, of Basilee, county of Renfrew, Scotland, for £400 sterling, deed dated March 10, 1798. These two brothers came to Ryegate in the spring of 1798, and settled on it with their families. Major Witherspoon had felled some twenty acres of trees, more or less, part had been cleared, but twenty-one years after, when the Whitehills came, it was about all covered with bushes and trees again. Dr. Witherspoon belonged to the General Assembly Presbyterian church. He preached in Ryegate, once or more, in 1775, 1782 and 1786, and some wanted him for their settled minister, but they were not able to get and retain such a celebrated man.
William Neilson, born in Erskine parish, Renfrewshire, Scotland, in 1742, came to Ryegate October 9, 1774, with his wife, Jean Stuart, and three chil- dren, William, Jr., born in 1767, Robert, born in 1770, and Mary, born in 1772. The oldest child, Janet, born in 1766, died a child. John Neilson, their third son, was born in Ryegate, February 5, 1776, the second white male child born in the town. His other sons born in Ryegate were James and Thomas, and his daughters, Janet and Isabel. Janet died about 1794. William and Robert went to Lyman, N. H., when young men, and lived there through life. John, James and Thomas were all prominent men, and lived here through life. Mary was married to Hugh Gardner, in 1791, and raised a large family, mostly daughters. Isabel was married to Peter Mc- Laughlin, Esq., of Groton, Vt., and raised a family. William Neilson has a very large number of descendants scattered far and wide. He was a man of medium height, a large bony frame, extremely muscular, one of the strongest men ever lived in Ryegate. He had daring courage and most de- termined spirit. On one occasion, in the Revolutionary war, when an alarm was raised of the enemy approaching, when all the people of Ryegate fled to Newbury block-house for protection, he remained alone, determined to fight and die before he would leave his home. It was a false alarm, but after
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one experience in the solitude of a vast wilderness, away from supports in case of disaster, he resolved never to repeat it. He came to Ryegate with very little of wealth, grew up with the country, amassed a large property, and before his death was without doubt the richest man that ever lived in Ryegate. The name was uniformly spelled Neilson for the first fifty years in the history of Ryegate, but for the past fifty years it has nearly always been spelled Nelson. He departed this life January 23, 1831, in the eighty- ninth year of his age. .
Daniel Hunt, born in Kingston, N. H., in April, 1719, married Mary Trussell, of that place, and their children were Samuel, Nehemiah, Mary, Daniel, Henry, Zebulon, Moses and Joshua, all born in Kingston. Evidence once given in Danville court in a law suit, was that the parents, with part of the family, came to Ryegate in the spring of 1773, and continued here. Three were in the battle of Bunker Hill, Moses, a fifer, Joshua, a cook, and Zebulon, a private. Joshua was a soldier in Upper Coos. They en- listed as soldiers from Bath, N. H. Daniel Hunt, the father, died in 1807, and his wife in 1795. Both are buried in the Scotch cemetery. Joshua Hunt was born in 1759, married Elizabeth Whittlesey, of Newbury, Vt., in 1780. Of his family, Mehitable, born in 1788, Joshua, Jr., born in 1790, Chapin, born in 1794, Eli, in 1797, Worcester, in 1799, Leonard, in 1801, William, in 1834, and James Mitchell, in 1807. Joshua died in 1815, and his widow in 1823. S. S. Hunt, his grandson, owns the saw-mill at the out- let of North pond, and manufactures lumber of all kinds extensively.
Aaron Hosmer is supposed to have been the first person who ever lived in Ryegate. He was living in a cabin near the Connecticut river, about a mile and a half above the present village of Wells River, and supported himself by hunting and fishing, when the Scotch commissioners first arrived here, June 28, 1773. They report " he had been here some time." He married Caroline Chamberlin, of Newbury, and lived in Newbury in 1781, after leav- ing Ryegate, and again he lived in the southwestern part of Barnet, and afterwards in Groton. His granddaughter, Mrs. Welch, thinks he married after going to Newbury. He was probably the "first who raised smoke on boiled water in the bounds of Ryegate." Aaron, the hunter, was born in 1724, and died in Groton, August 6, 1803, aged seventy-nine years. The name is generally pronounced " Osmore " in Groton.
Dea. John Hyndman was born in 1740, and with his wife, Janet, and oldest son, William, came from Killallan parish, Renfrewshire, Scotland, to America, about 1771, locating in Philadelphia. He afterwards lived in Baltimore, and again in Philadelphia, and first came to Ryegate with James Findley. on a prospecting tour, and again with his family in the autumn of 1773. He re- ceived from Rev. Dr. John Witherspoon 100 acres of land for having been the first permanent settler in Ryegate. His daughter Janet was the first child born in the town, February 28, 1774. He took a prominent part in public affairs in the early days, and was moderator in town meeting March 26, 1782.
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His third daughter, Anna, was born in Lyman, N. H., April 3, 1785. He had six children, three sons and three daughters-four of whom were born in Ryegate. It is probable he left the town about 1783. He was an elder in the Associate (Seceder) Presbyterian church, of Barnet, Vt., but afterwards joined the Reformed (Covenanter) Presbyterian church, of Barnet and Rye- gate, where he continued many years. He died at Stevens Village, Barnet, May 11, 1834, aged ninety-four years, and was buried in the old cemetery there. Some have changed the spelling of the name to Hindman, and some to Hinman.
David Reid came to Ryegate October 7, 1774, from Scotland. He was one of the three Revolutionary soldiers furnished by Ryegate in 1777. He was a short, plump, round faced man, with a pleasant countenance, and was naturally peaceable. His wife, called "Lucky," was a small-sized woman, whose leading trait was "condensed hate" against her husband. They had frequent and violent quarrels, resulting in Reid's getting a divorce from her, though she received an annuity from him of $20.00. She applied to the town for help, and March 25, 1788, it was "voted that the town shall have nothing to do with Mrs. Reid the year ensuing." She had no children. She finally died a pauper. David again married, a widow Kincaid, of Haverhill, who had six small children. With her he lived happily, raising the children to men and women. David Reid died February 16, 1821, aged eighty-one years.
James Whitehill, the father of the Reformed (Covenanter) Presbyterian church in Ryegate, and the first elder of the same, was born in Inchinan, Ren- frewshire, Scotland, in 1750, and married Mary Mitchell in 1769. He had by her four daughters, viz. : Elizabeth, Agness, Mary and Christian, and one son, John. His first wife died, and in 1792 he married Mary Caldwell. Of this second marriage, there were born in Scotland James, in 1793, Jean, in 1795, and Janet, in 1797. He came with his family to Ryegate in 1798. He and his brother Abraham had bought the Major Witherspoon tract of 600 acres in the northwestern corner of the town. The deed was dated March 10, 1798, and the price was £400 sterling. His brother took the three north lots, and he took the south ones. His family have been very prolific, as a rule, his son John married twice, and was the father of twenty children. John Park has been the only other instance in town of one's being the father of an equal number. He was charitable to the poor and liberal in support of the gospel. His habits were those of industry, serenity and piety, He was mod- est and diffident even to a fault. Of his children born in Ryegate were Will- iam, born in 1801, Abraham, in 1805, and Margaret. Rev. William Gibson came to Ryegate in 1799, and lived with him a year. His wife died in 1834, and he died in 1835, aged eighty-five years.
Abraham Whitehill, born in Inchinan (anciently Killinan), Scotland, in 1759, married Elizabeth Patterson, December 12, 1781, and their children born in Scotland were Mary, Agnes, John, Elizabeth, Abraham, Jean, James, William and one lassie. They came to Ryegate in 1800, and owned the
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first three lots in the north range. Here were born Peter, in 1800, and An- drew, July 25, 1804. Abraham, Jr., was killed by a tree falling when about twenty-three, probably the first person killed in Ryegate. Elder Ja nes White- hill and Abraham Whitehill both built stone houses, the only ones in Ryegate. He died in 1813, aged fifty-four years, and his widow died in 1839, while re- siding with her son Peter, in Groton, aged eighty-one years.
Alexander Miller was born in Scotland, in 1758. He married Jane, daugh- ter of David Allen, about 1780, who was born in Inchinan parish, Scotland, about 1760. Two children, Margaret and Robert, were born in Scotland, and Robert died at sea, in August, 1784, aged one year. Mr. Miller and his family arrived in Ryegate September 1, 1874, and settled on the farm that his youngest son, Robert, now owns. He had a family of fifteen children-seven sons and eight daughters-thirteen of whom were born in Ryegate. Eight daughters and five sons lived to an adult age, and two are now living, Robert, in his seventy-sixth year, in Ryegate, and Alexander, in Lunenburgh, Vt., in his eighty-third year. Alexander, Sr., was a hard working, enterprising and prosperous farmer, and also owned and carried on an oat, barley and saw-mill, on Wells river, one mile below South Ryegate. He died February 12, 1835, aged seventy-seven years. His widow died February 22, 1839, in her seven- ty-eighth year.
Hugh Gardner, born in Erskine, Scotland, in 1751, came to Ryegate in 1784, the first blacksmith in town. He married Mary Nelson, daughter of William, February 9, 1791, and reared a family of twelve children, viz : Jean, Margaret, Isabel, Janet, Agnes, William, died, Mary, William, Elizabeth, Sarah, and Hannah and Hugh, twins. Nine of his family were married, and nearly all raised large families, numbering in all eighty-three grandchildren. He was noted for his solid honesty, and held various offices, was an elder in the Covenanter church, and died February 1, 1815, in his sixty-fourth year. His widow died October 6, 1825, aged fifty-three years.
James Henderson, born in Kilbarchan, Scotland, in 1749, learned the joiner trade with Allen, of Inchman, and came to America with Whitelaw and Allen in 1773. He came from New York to Hartford in a sloop, and up the Con- necticut river in a canoe freighted with the chests and tools of Whitelaw, Allen and his own, reaching Newbury, November 8, 1773. They all cane to Ryegate together, and he was the first carpenter in town. On January 9, 1777, he married Agnes Sym, the first marriage in town. He was also the first militia captain in town. He had six children-four sons and two daughters. He held important offices in town, was prominent in the church, and died September 13, 1834, in his eighty-fifth year. His wife died December 20, 1812, in her sixtieth year.
John Cameron, born in Lochaber, Scotland, in 1761, came to America about 1790. He first bought a strip of land in the western part of Ryegate, half a mile wide and about three miles long. He afterwards traded 200 acres on the north end, with John Orr, for about 107 acres at Ryegate Corner, and
19*
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sold the balance. He married Elizabeth Stark, daughter of Gen. John Stark, of Manchester, N. H., about 1793. He came to town with a large amount of money. Tradition has it that his ancestors were not exemplary. He started, probably, the first store in town, and with his wealth was a great man for many years, being town representative for fourteen years, but not consecu - tively. He was a Democrat of the extreme cast, and in obedience to a vow once made when liquor was in and wit was out, he named an unborn child Thomas Jefferson, which proved to be a daughter, but the name was retained. He was a county court judge in 1814. He had ten children by his first wife, four of whom died in childhood. She died May 13, 1813, aged forty- two years. "John Cameron took to wife Persis Whitaker, September 28, 1814, and recorded December 22, 1817," is the record in Ryegate. He had no ceremony to his second marriage. By her he had four daughters and two sons, making sixteen children in all. One son in the first family was named Uz, and the second he had Jemima, Kezia and Keren-Happock, and yet he held the book of Job to be a novel. His second wife was a. very kind-hearted, worthy woman. She died in Fryburg, Me., in November, 1875. Judge Cameron in after life became poor, and died March 4, 1837, aged seventy· six years.
Alexander Gibson was born in Ashenlodment, three miles west of Paisley, Scotland, in 1789, and was the seventh in the family of William Gibson, who had thirteen children, of whom four died in infancy. His father was born in 1754, and his mother, whose maiden name was Margaret Aiken, was born in Lochwinnoch, in 1755. His father's surviving family-seven sons and two daughters-came to Ryegate in June, 1801. He married Jean Gardner, the oldest daughter of Hugh, in 1814. He first lived in the western part of Ryegate, and afterwards on the Gardner farm, three quarters of a mile south- west of Ryegate Corner. He raised a family of six sons and three daughters, all of whom lived to be men and women. In his day and generation he was- the "king farmer of Ryegate." He coined the "golden moments," con- tinuosly into hard cash. He was extraordinarily industrious and persevering. No lazy man ever abhored work to the degree that he loved it. He lived to. see eight of his children married, and all well settled in life. He was an elder in the United Presbyterian church, and a strong pillar in it. His son John became a minister in the same denomination. His wife died March 31, 1853, in her sixty-second year. He died June 6, 1869, in his eighty-first year.
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