USA > Vermont > Caledonia County > St Johnsbury > The town of St. Johnsbury, Vt. ; a review of one hundred twenty-five years to the anniversary pageant 1912 > Part 3
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Your friend and humble serv't,
JONA. ARNOLD.
Between the lines of this letter one may read that Arnold's solicitude was not so much for the people east of the Connecticut as for those on the Vermont side. He was tremendously interested in the stout fight the Green Mountain Boys had put up for inde- pendence ; it was exactly in the line of the Rhode Island Manifesto which he had drawn up in 1776. He engaged their enemies the Yorkers on the floor of debate, as they had engaged them on the contested field. To the rumor that his interest in Vermont had led him to communicate proceedings that had taken place in secret session, he made emphatic denial before his colleagues in Con- gress. After a time he determined to make Vermont his home. In view of public services he had rendered, the state made excep- tional contracts with him for lands now included in Lyndon and St. Johnsbury. His independent spirit, tinged with a bit of cyni- cism, is revealed in a letter addressed to one of his business friends.
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PIONEERING
"I must confess I feel myself happy in having risked so much on the Vermont bottom -X X here we may retire; a few acres will easily supply all real wants ; are we distant from circles of wealth and ambition? We are the same distance from heresy, confusion, chicane and disappointment. Are we remote from friends ? We are equally so from flatterers and defrauders." This probably refers to the gross mismanagement that had recently wrecked his foundry enterprise at Winchester, N. H., the agents of which he terms "as finished a set of villains as ever graced a halter."
TOWN SURVEYS
On the 8th of March, 1787, Dr. Arnold, then in Bennington, wrote Esquire Whitelaw about completing the survey of the town lines and laying out the lots of 300 acres each.
"I am to desire you to get Josiah Nichols and Martin Adams to assist you to make the same, which I wish to be done plain and distinct ; and if Mr. Adams, or Nichols cannot attend that service, the old gentleman or Mr. Simeon Cole may be applied to, though I hope and expect that Mr. Cole will be otherwise engaged for me at that time. You will please call on Mr. E. R. Chamberlin for pork and flour for this service, and get some rum from Col. Thos. Johnston. I hope to be with you early in May and fix the magazine for your supplies. I inclose a sketch of the manner which I think will lay the lots to best advantage in St. Johnsbury-if you can better it, you will. De- siring you to make my compliments agreeable to all friends in that quarter, I am, Sir, with esteem, your assured friend and humble servant.
JONA. ARNOLD.
Dr. Arnold, as we have already seen, was on the ground the first week in May, felling the forest and assisting in the surveys- Esquire Whitelaw was soon appointed Surveyor General ; the fol- lowing sample of his journal entries is taken from the
FIELD BOOK SURVEYS TOWN LINES ST. JOHNSBURY
"Began the W line of St. Johnsbury at N W being Birch tree marked Lyndon S W Corner Nov. 16, 1786, and ran S 60, 20 E. At 18 ch. brook 10 links wide runs S W ; at 63 ch. little brook runs W 1 mile on W branch of brook 10 links wide running S Easterly by an Alder marked M. 1, 1787, and an alder meadow 2 miles, a stake 12 links S 40° W fr. a fir tree on land descending
34
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
East-the wood elm, fir, beech, ash and maple, excellent land for grass. At 8 ch. a stream 3 rods wide runs N E * * 7 miles a stake 8 links Westerly fr. a little birch on S side of hill ; ; this chiefly uneven, the wood beech and maple, good for grain and pasture ; at 51 ch Barnet Corner at hemlock tree marked Barnet Cor. Mch. 23, 1784, standing on flat land on edge of brook running S E, wood chiefly hemlock. A lot in St. Johnsbury is 310 acres, 1 rood, 22 poles.
The items that follow are found in the account of Surveyor General James Whitelaw as presented to the state treasurer.
To provisions, etc., furnished by Dr. Jona. Arnold £ 52 4 5}
To one quart of Rum 010
To seven males' victuals at 10 d. 0 5 10
To 2 days settling acc'ts with Jona. Arnold Esq. 140
To a man and horse 1 Day
0 60
To 2 camp Kettles
0 80
To 1 Quart West India Rum
020
To Entertainment (?) for Hands
0 10 0
To 2 Bags worn out in the surveys
0 12 0
To Dr. Arnold's Account
118 5 0를
To 7 lbs. Salt Pork (of Capt. Colt) and 2 gals. Rum
0 17 0
To 35 days Surveying
21 0
To 4 days making Plan * to locate the Flying Grants 2
8 0
The entries that follow are copied from the Surveyor Gen- eral's account with Jonathan Arnold :
1787 May 22, To 4 days running the line between St. Johnsbury and Danville £ 280
Oct. 30, To 3 Plans of St. Johnsbury on Vellum 2 18 0
Oct. 15 To 3 Plans of St. Johnsbury on paper 1 10 0
1788 Nov. 1 To 1 day laying out some 100-acre lots in St. Johns- bury 0 10 0
1789 Jan. To 3 days ditto and surveying on the River 1 10 0
To 2 day for proprietors St. J. running the E. Line 0 0
1790 To pasturing a yoke of oxen and one cow from July 2 to Aug. 20; 7 weeks 0 17 0 0 0
1791 May 9 To arbitration
1792 May 29 To calculating a piece of land north of Dr. Lord's farm on the South end of Arnold's Plain and making a Plan of Billymead 0 7 6
To cash paid treasurer, part of St. Johnsbury Charter Fees, in 1789 50 10 0
1795 To 8 days at different times appraising estate (of Dr. Arnold) 2 80
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PIONEERING
For services rendered by town proprietors in the first land surveys as reported to the State by the Surveyor General, the sum of £537 13s 7d, was discounted on the Charter Fees of St. Johnsbury and Danville. Surveyor General Whitelaw's duties in surveying the towns of St. Johnsborough, Linden and others" were certified to by Isaac Tichenor Esq. afterward Governor of Vermont, as well and faithfully executed.
1135625
STORY OF SLEEPY HOLLOW
Belonging to the period of the town surveys is the tradition, pretty well authenticated, of what may properly be called our Sleepy Hollow. Arnold, Whitelaw, and their men were laying out lines along the West Branch where the Scale factory grew up in after years. This land and water privilege was in original Right No. 9, which belonged to Dr. Arnold. While he and the other men were penetrating the forest to complete the survey, the provisions and equipments including certain necessary stimulants, were left in charge of Thomas Todd, with instructions to guard the same with care. Todd, for some reason, concluded to remove this miscel- lany from the bushes down to the river bank ; where, on the re- turn of the party, he was found rolled up against a log, fast asleep. Thereupon Dr. Arnold woke the sleeper with a shout and made proclamation-"Let this West Branch be known forever after by the name of Sleeper's River!"
PIONEER SETTLERS
"Q. Who was the first man?" "A. Adam. Catechism."
The first man who settled in this town was Adams.
In October, 1786, perhaps at an earlier date, he and his family, originally from Scotland, packed their belongings in boats at Springfield, Mass., and started to row their way up in to the forests of Vermont. There were seven in the family-James Adams, the father and Submit Marvin his wife ; a group of stal- wart sons, Jonathan Adams, James Calendar Adams, Martin
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TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
Adams, Charles Adams, and a daughter Polly Adams. Their boats were rigged with rafters over which canvas and blankets were stretched for protection against storms and the cold of au- tumnal nights. Considerable furniture was stowed away in the boats, including a loom and spinning wheel, the great clock, chests of clothing, bedding and similar articles of luxury, besides a sup- ply of provisions. Rowing up stream against the current and getting the boats around the rapids, brought them to the river Pasumsuk, up which they worked their way to the mouth of the West Branch where they landed and made a pitch on the rising ground which is now at the foot of Pearl St.
LIFE IN A LOG HOUSE
The first habitation in the town was set up here, six months or more before the boundaries of the township had been fully surveyed. Logs with notched ends were properly fitted together with mud and twigs for calking, and heavy pine boughs laid up and down and crosswise for a roof. Planks were hewn out and jointed together with wooden pins for a door which was securely fastened on the inside by a hemlock slab thrown across for a bolt. A floor of plank was laid and rows of pegs for hanging up things adorned the walls. Over the small openings for windows were laid strips of oiled paper as a substitute for glass, when the shutters were not down. Layers of pine and spruce boughs made a fragrant founda- tion for beds. Tables and chairs and benches were made on the spot. The loom, the spinning wheel and the indispensable boot- jack were installed in their places. After the first fire had been started by sparks from a flint on dry shavings a perpetual fire was kept on the cobble stone hearth, for as yet there were no neigh- bors from whom to borrow a dish full of coals. Rugs and coats for the winter were made of bear skins, mittens and caps from coon or fox pelts. The table was bountifully supplied with fish from the rivers, with roast partridge or wild turkey, with lean bear steak and salt pork made from salted bear fat, supplemented with coffee made of dried peas and an infusion of "tea from sage leaves healthful and comforting."
The first religious service held in St. Johnsbury was the even- ing worship of the Adams family, who by the fire-light of burning
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PIONEERING
logs read from their Bible, sang hymns and prayed to the God of their fathers whose Scotch devotion and reverence for religion was thus introduced into this dense wilderness.
Before the first of November other immigrants had arrived ; Simeon Cole, whose pitch was on the bluff above the upper meadows where the Edson tavern went up eleven years later ; Josiah Nichols a surveyor ; Thomas Todd, Jonathan Trescott, and William Trescott, a breezy adventurer who soon won the affec- tions of Polly Adams and took her to wife. All the men who planted themselves here during or prior to the fall of 1786 secured land rights as actual settlers. Their principal assets were axes, muskets and muscle ; some not having money to purchase lands were entitled to a hundred acres each for having settled on the same prior to the issue of the town charter whereon their names appear as grantees.
The Adams family scattered after a time-Jonathan went to Ohio where he reared thirteen sons. In a letter to his youngest brother Charlie he said, "I want the people of St. Johnsbury to know that I built the first brush heap ever put up in that town." This Charlie was the lad of thirteen who caught up fire brands to pelt the bear with on a trip with Trescott down Lord's Hill. Mrs. Submit Adams died Nov. 18, A. D. 1790, aged 67, as we read on her grave stone in the old burial plot near the Waterford town line ; the resting place of the first woman who ever kept house within the bounds of this township. Family tradition records that James Adams, the father, drew valuable land rights in Littleton, i. e. Waterford, by the exercise of his gifts as a singer. While camp- ing with a party of surveyors, a first choice of lands was put up for the man who could give the best rendering of a song. Adams won by singing the song "Brave Wolfe," written by his son Jona- than, a copy of which in the original handwriting, is now in pos- session of Mrs. Hannah Adams Hudson, from whose family papers the foregoing narrative has been compiled.
Some additional facts with variants have been given by an- other descendant, Judge W. H. Taylor of Hardwick. His version reports that the family came from Massachusetts to Tinmouth about 1774; that James, Martin and Jonathan were in the Revo- lutionary Army ; that at the close of the war they obtained rights in
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TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
the township of Littleton, which then included Waterford, and came up the Passumpsic valley to take possession as early maybe as 1783. The first meeting of the proprietors of Littleton was held in Barnet, Nov. 18, 1783, and, as the record says "adjourned to the house of James Adams in said Littleton." The rein was a curious misunderstanding. James Adams' house was not in Lit- tleton. It was where the foot of Pearl street now is in this town. Apparently he had come up the valley looking for a desirable location and pitched by mistake above the Littleton line which veers easterly from the river two miles lower down. When the St. Johnsbury township lines were run out in 1787, it was found that James and Martin Adams had a residence on Right Number 6, and the four Adams men were admitted on the town charter as original grantees.
Martin Adams' log house adjoined his father's, and to it he brought his bride, Mercy Ryder of Barnet, in October, 1785. This place he sold in June, 1791, to Dr. Lord and made a new pitch on Right 48, three miles up the river ; he was made selectman at the first town meeting and his brother Jonathan was our first town treasurer ; in 1793 he bought lands on Lake Memphremagog and was the first settler in Duncansboro, now Newport. Four of his twelve children were born in this town.
GETTING MEAL, RUM AND POTATOES
Once up in this wilderness there was little contact with the outside world. The younger men took occasional tramps down the trail to Barnet to replenish the meal bag ; before returning, Martin Adams found it convenient to call at Mercy Ryder's door and enquire the time of day. Joel Roberts somewhat later qual- ified for arduous duty as first selectman by tramping up from Bar- net with a two bushel bag of meal on his back and a gallon of rum in his hand. It is related of another man of less confident footing that in bringing home a bag of potatoes on his back, a rent in the corner of the bag let out one potato. Lest he should lose his balance by stooping for it, and unwilling to part with so dainty a morsel, he propelled the tuber by the toe of his boot up Lord's Hill to his cabin door. Tradition assigns this particular
39
PIONEERING
potato to Thomas Todd. The idea of a locomotive hauling sup- plies up the trail they laboriously traveled would have been as remote from their thought as a trip to the moon.
The necessaries of life were few, hard money was scarce ; wild meat, grain and furs were legal tender. A letter has been found written by one Merritt, who lived near the Adams meadow. It seems that he had been dunned by Capt. Lovell for a debt. His reply states that he had "just hoed in 3 acres of wheat, a few potatoes and some barley which was all the property he had in the world except flint, powder and gun." He will start out on a hunt the very next day and if Providence favors with usual suc- cess he promises to pay the debt with furs.
GETTING MEAT
"MEAT! MEAT ! Bo-bo! Bo-bo-bo !"-Congo Cannibals.
"MEAT? WE? What an atrocious idea!"-Stanley.
Human nature is the same whether in the forests of the Congo or of the Passumpsic-its demand is for meat-man meat or moose meat. How Daniel Hall got moose meat will appear in the following notes taken verbatim from the lips of Stevens, the narrator, in 1860.
"Hall had grant of land from Dr. Arnold-100 acres-in St. Johnsbury -west bank of Passumpsic-above Plain-mistake about the deed-another 100 acres up in Lyndon-Hall satisfied-next morning up early-packs wife and goods on hand sled-tramps to Lyndon-good going on crust-unpacks wife and goods-builds fire-sets up wigwam-moves in wife and goods-all settled-next morning no victuals-takes gun and into forest-tracks a moose -big one-shoots moose-skins haunch-cuts out steak-carries back to wife -she delighted-heard gun go off-thought breakfast was coming-they roast meat on forked sticks-good breakfast but no salt or pepper-then call up neighbors-they go and skin moose-each has a piece-Hall gets out hand sled-loads on moose meat and pelt-back to St. Johnsbury-trades-gets 3 pecks potatoes, half bushel meal, peck salt-carries home to wife-wife de- lighted-sundown."
This Daniel Hall had made his way up the Connecticut river some while before in a boat. He or his wife or both of them had read in their Bible the fourth commandment, and their oars rested
40
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
quietly in the boat on the Sabbath Day. At one time General Bayley sent him on a mission to Canada to work up trade with the St. Francis Indians. There was no commandment in his Bible forbidding brandy and he innocently took along ten gallons of it as a probable stimulant to trade. While paddling his canoe on Lake Memphremagog he came upon an Indian who was fishing. He captured him, bound his hands and made him show the way to the Indian camp. Here he made known his peaceful errand, negotiated terms of barter and incidentally secured some Indian scouts who did valuable service among the settlements.
THE SEVENTH MAN
Of other pioneers of eighty-six few traces are found. Todd as we have seen, took a nap and thereafter it was Sleeper's River. The two Trescotts lived and died in this vicinity. Jonathan at one time thought he would emigrate and sent out this
"Friendly Salutation-Know all men by these lines that the undersigner is expecting to leave this country, and wishes all his friends or foes, if any, to call on him by the 20th of May instant, and he will endeavor to make them satisfaction. * * Adieu! wishing all God's blessing here on earth and eternal life hereafter when I hope to meet you all again. Jonathan Trescott."
He probably remained in town however and died here at the age of 88; it says on the gravestone that "He was one of the first settlers in town, being the seventh inhabitant." His brother Bill was the hero of the first bear story, as will be seen in the next paragraph. On being disinterred for re-burial in Mt. Pleasant in 1856, the body of Jonathan Trescott was found to be complete- ly solidified; it gave a ringing sound to the spade and was heavier than four men could lift.
DOWN HILL WITH A BEAR
"No bear can keep his footing on a steep hill-side ; whenever an Indian is in trouble with a bear he takes down hill, lets the bear overtake him, then knifes him." Joaquin Miller.
Tradition is clear and details are explicit as to this perform- ance in 1790, on the edge of the gravel bank south of the Plain.
41
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PIONEERING
This tract of land belonged to Dr. Lord, and Bill Trescott was at work clearing and burning it over. On his way back from tuck- ing up the fires one evening after dusk, a bulky object rose before him. Trescott was powerful and resolute, not minded to dodge anything whatever that stood in his way. Striding forward he found himself grabbed by a bear. It was on the edge of a steep pitch, down which the two rolled in this close embrace, till cradled in the hollow of an uprooted stump. Hoping to scare off the bear, Charlie Adams hurled blazing fire brands at him from the top of the hill. Trescott was underneath the bear, but he held himself master of the situation. With his right hand, which was free, he brought a stout knife from his pocket, opened the blade with his teeth and applied it to the jugular vein of the bear. This released the man and quieted the frantic yelping of Jack, his dog. The next morning the bear killer was hailed in the settlement with all the honors of a conquering hero. The story of his en- counter is not so improbable if we allow that this was a young and inexperienced bear. Trescott in later years became the most famous Post Rider in the county, and as such was personated at the Pageant of 1912. He lived till 1831, and as late as 1871 per- sons who had known him well said they had often heard him tell his bear story with animation and honest pride.
"Bill Trescott was an old revolutionary soldier, a very pro- nounced character with a genius for invention and an experience of perilous adventures and narrow escapes. It was his great de- light to be seated on his old horse, his saddle bags filled with papers, and a tin horn of huge dimensions with its small end in- serted in his boot leg. He was at home in everyone's house, welcome at everyone's table, had an inexhaustible fund of news, ancedotes and stories, was full and bubbling over with jocundity and keen repartee."
NEW LANDS ON THE PASSUMPSICK
These lands were advertised in the Providence Gazette of June 27, 1787, as being 4
"on or near the pleasant and healthful River Passumpsick, County of Orange, State of Vermont-inferior to none in quality and climate, for those
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TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
who prefer a competency with health and safety to luxury with infirmity and danger. Titles to every lot will be had from the original grantees, payment to be made in cattle, country produce and labour. For further particulars apply to the subscriber in St. Johnsbury, who will show, not maps and charts, varigated with imaginary Plains, Vallies and Streams, but the soil itself. JONATHAN ARNOLD."
During the same year Dr. Arnold, in a letter to his parents says, "It would give me pleasure to accommodate some of your smart Smithfield young men with good land for farms. The present price is one dollar per acre ; twenty dollars on a hundred acres in hard money down; fifty dollars in neat cattle in six months, and thirty dollars in neat stock or grain in eighteen months or as grain may be grown on the land. My corn has yielded twenty-five bushels to the acre, and my potatoes 564 72 bushels measured out. Should any wish to come and see before they purchase, it will suit me best, as the land will bear exam- ining."
IMMIGRATION
This was an attractive proposition to young men of southern New England, where conditions were not very satisfactory. Mc- Master says that in the fall of 1786 "crops were good but pockets were empty. With difficulty could a few pistareens or coppers be scraped together. Farmers hunted to find a cobbler who would take wheat for shoes, or a trader who would give everlasting shoe material, in exchange for pumpkins." Enterprising young men began to make their way up into this wilderness where good land could be had for a dollar an acre. The next few years found David Goss, Jeriah Hawkins, Abel Shorey established on the upper waters of West Branch; Reuben Spaulding was beginning a Spaulding Neighborhood; John and Samuel Ayer made an Ayer District ; Gardner Wheeler and his brother Martin with Joel. Roberts and Eleazer Sanger cut in at the Four Corners ; John Ide, John Armington, Nath'1 Bishop, David Lawrence, John and Barnabas Barker, Caleb Wheaton and Asquire Aldrich, most of them from Rehoboth, took up a chain of rights running from the Crow Hill region to the south line of the township. Lieut. Thomas Pierce bought 300 acres which included part of what is
43
PIONEERING
now the Center Village and the high field where the old Meeting House was planted ; near by were Daniel Pierce and Oliver Ste- vens; farther up Ephraim Humphrey ; lower down Nathaniel Edson; others at various points. Most of these men came to town on foot or with ox carts. Some may have had a horse or two. They lived in log houses and thrived and multiplied. Noth- ing checked the cheerful growth of population. Children among a few of these families, as reported, numbered-six, six, six, eight, eight, eight, nine, ten, ten, ten, ten, twelve, fourteen, fif- teen-many families not yet heard from. Quite a number of the fathers and mothers went on into the eighties and nineties ; Jeriah Hawkins reached ninety-nine years; Mrs. O. Stevens one hun- dred and one. There are no traditions of nervous prostration, dispeptic incapacity, anemic blood or appendicitic disturbances.
AS TO THE SOILS
Of the New Lands on the Passumpsic, a writer somewhat later remarked, "the soil of the early clearings was rich and in- viting to the adventurer. In some localities wooded with firs and hemlocks it was dry and sandy; in others dark, moist, rich, shaded with maple, elm and bass, underskirted with nettles and polypods. These maple and elm lots were uniformly the first choice of the settlers. The first few rounds of crops equalled their expectation, but in less than thirty years it was plainly shown that in point of value and productiveness the evergreen lands were much superior to the dark soils so deceptively luxu- riant in their primitive verdure."
Riding up Passumpsic Valley today one sees regretfully long stretches of yellow sand resembling the wind-swept surface of a desert. This shows how thin was the crust of good soil origi- nally laid on these slopes. A patch of bare sand not more than two yards square on the Wing Hill region as remembered by a resident there, has now become forty acres of barrenness. A speedy re-foresting with pine seedlings is demanded to stay the progress of these on-creeping sand dunes.
The early settlers facing trees were seized with a spirit of ravage. Their stout axes knew no respite, gave no quarter; the
44
TOWN OF ST. JOHNSBURY
tree was a Canaanite marked for extermination. Not only were meadows and slopes transformed into pleasant fields, but precipi- tous pitches that needed interweaving roots to hold the soil, were shorn of their glory and left with an offer of scant feed and pre- carious footing to the meandering cow. As late as 1850, there were black stumps for boys to burn on the ragged edges and steep descents of the Plain, as this writer well remembers. Then went out the last remnant of the Canaanite in the land.
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