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TOPOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL 
 
 SKETCHES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 TOWN OF NORTHBOROUGH, 
 
 WITH THE 
 
 EARLY HISTORY OF 
 
 'Amm^®m®w@u* 
 
 IN THE 
 
 (ftommoutoealtlj of J&assacljuscttss, 
 
 FURNISHED FOR THE 
 
 WORCESTER MAGAZINE. 
 
 BY REV. JOSEPH AXaLEN, 
 
 PASTOR OF THE CHURCH IN NORTHBOROUGH, AND MEMBER OF THE 
 WORCESTER COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 
 
 WORCESTER: 
 
 PUBLISHED 8Y W. LINCOLN & C, C. BALDWIN, 
 
 CHARLES GRIFFIN PRINTER. 
 
 1826. 
 
F1 
 
 7/B 
 
 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 IN orthborough, though one of the youngest and smallest incor- 
 porated towns in the County of Worcester, was, for nearly 50 years, 
 prior to the date of its incorporation, a part of Westborough ; first 
 as part of an undivided whole, and then as a separate precinct or 
 parish. This carries us hack to the year 1717, before which time, 
 Westborough itself, including Northborough, belonged to the large 
 and ancient town of Marlborough. Northborough then, as being 
 included in Marlborough, may lay claim to considerable antiquity. 
 Marlborough was incorporated in 1660, only about 30 years after 
 the commencement of the Massachusetts Colony. The stream of 
 emigration may easily be traced back from this, which was for ma- 
 ny years a frontier settlement, bordering upon the unexplored wil- 
 derness, to the fountain head. The settlement in Marlborough was 
 commenced four years before the date of its incorporation, by emi- 
 grants from Sudbury, which was older by about 20 years than 
 Marlborough, having been incorporated in 1638. The next step 
 carries us back to Concord, which was purchased of the natives 
 and incorporated in 1635.* 
 
 The next step brings us to Watertown, where a settlement wa3 
 made in 1630, the same year that Boston began to be built. It was 
 in this year that a large number of emigrants arrived from England, 
 which served greatly to enlarge and strengthen the Colony, then 
 in its infancy. The oldest town in the Massachusetts Colony is Sa- 
 lem, where a settlement was commenced in 1628, eight years after 
 the landing of our fathers at Plymouth. 
 
 * 1. Mass. Hist. Col. Vol. I. 
 1 
 
 M527521 
 
4 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 Thus we see that within the short space of 30 years from the 
 first planting of this Colony, the wilderness had been explored, and 
 a permanent settlement effected, by our enterprising forefathers, 
 in the ancient town of Marlborough, which then included Westbo- 
 rough, Southborough, and Northborough, now within the limits of 
 Worcester County. 
 
 It will not therefore be improper to prefix to the history of this 
 town some account of the first settlement and early history of the 
 Plantation at Marlborough. 
 
 The following petition was presented to the General Court 
 in May, 1656. 
 
 "To the Hon. Governor, Dep. Governor, Magistrates and Depu- 
 ties of the General Court now assembled in Boston." 
 
 "The humble petition of several of the Inhabitants of Sudbu- 
 ry, whose names are hereunder written, humbly sheweth ; that 
 whereas your petitioners have lived divers years in Sudbury, and 
 God hath beene pleased to increase our children, which are now 
 divers of them grown to man's estate, and wee, many of us, grown 
 into years, so as that wee should bee glad to see them settled be- 
 fore the Lord take us away from hence, as also God having given 
 us some considerable quantity of cattle, so that wee are so streigh- 
 tened that wee cannot so comfortably subsist as could bee desired ; 
 and some of us having taken some pains to view the country ; wee 
 have found a place which lyeth westward, about eight miles from 
 Sudbury, which wee conceive might bee comfortable for our sub- 
 sistence : 
 
 "It is therefore the humble request of your Petitioners to this 
 Hon'd Court, that you would bee pleased to grant unto us ( ) 
 eight miles square, or so much land as may containe to eight miles 
 square, for to make a plantation. 
 
 "If it shall please this Hon'd Court to grant our petition, it is 
 farther than the request of your petitioners to this Hon'd Court, 
 that you will bee pleased to appoint Mr. Thomas Danforth or Lies- 
 ten 01 Fisher to lay out the bounds of the Plantation; and wee 
 shall satisfy those whom this Hon'd Court shall please to employ in 
 it. So apprehending this weighty occasion, wee shall no farther 
 trouble this Hon'd Court, but shall ever pray for your happinesse." 
 Edmond Rice, Thomas King, William Ward, 
 
 John How,* John Bent, Sen'r. John Maynard, 
 
 * According to a tradition handed down in the family, the first English 
 person that cam*; to reside in Marlborough, was John How, son of a How, of 
 Watertown, supposed to be John How, Esq. who came from Warwickshire, in 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 John Woods, Edward Rice, John Ruddocke, 
 
 Richard Newton, Peter Bent, Henry Rice, 
 
 Thomas Goodenow. 
 "That this is a true copy of the original petition presented to 
 the General Court, May, 1656, left on file and thereto compared, is 
 Attested, per Edward Rawson, Sec'n/." 
 To this petition the following answer was made. 
 At a General Court held in Boston, May 14, 1756. 
 
 "In answer to the petition of the aforesaid inhabitants of Sudbury, 
 the Court judgeth it meete to grant them a proportion of land of 
 six miles, or otherwise, in some convenient form equivalent there- 
 unto, at the discretion of the committee in the place desired, pro- 
 vided it hinder no former grant, that there bee a Towne settled 
 with twenty or more families within three years, so as an able min- 
 istry may bee there maintained. And it is ordered that Mr. Ed- 
 ward Jackson, Capt. Eleazer Lusher, Ephruim Child, with Mr. 
 Thomas Danforth, or Liesten" 1 Fisher, shall bee, and hereby are ap- 
 pointed as a committee to lay out the bounds thereof, and make 
 return to the next Court of Election, or else the grant to bee void. 
 "This is a true copy taken out of the Court's Books of Records, 
 as Attests Edward Rawson, Seer'?/." 
 
 England, and who, as appears from a record in the possession of Mr. Adam 
 How, of Sudbury, also a descendant of John, was himself the son of John 
 How, of Hodinhull. and connected with the family of Lord Charles How, 
 Earl of Lancaster, in the rti^n of Charles I. 
 
 Mr. How came from Watertown to Marlborough, built a cabin a little to 
 the east of the Indian Planting field, where his descendants lived fot 
 many generations. By his prudence and kindness, he gained the good will 
 and confidence of his savage neighbors, who accordingly made him the um- 
 pire in all their differences. 
 
 The following is related as one of the verdicts of this second Solomon. 
 Two Indians, whose corn fields were contiguous, disputed about the posses- 
 sion of a pumpkin, which grew on a vine, that had transgressed the limits of 
 the field in which it was planted. The vine was planted in one field ; the 
 pumpkin grew in the other. The dispute grew warm, and might have led to 
 serious consequences, had it not occurred to them to refer the matter in de- 
 bate to the arbitration of the white man, their neighbor. Mr. How is accord- 
 ingly sent for, who after having given a patient hearing to both parties, directs 
 them to bring him a knife, with which he divides the pumpkin into two equal 
 parts, giving half to each. Both parties extol the equity of the judge, and 
 readily acquiesce in the decision, pleased, no doubt, quite as much with the 
 manuer in which the thing was done, as in admiration of the justice of 
 the deed. 
 
 The descendants of John How are very numerous in Marlborough, and in 
 the towns in the vicinity. There are 28 of the name of How on the list of 
 voters, in Marlborough, for the present year. 
 
 Col. Thomas How was a son of the above, who, for many years, was one 
 of the leading men in the town. John How died sometime before 1686, as 
 appears by a deed of his son Josiah to Thomas, of that date. Rev. Perley 
 How, of Surry, N.H. was a descendant ef John, and of Col. Thomas How. 
 
D HISTORY OF HORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 The Plantation was accordingly soon commenced in the neigh- 
 borhood of Ockoocangansett, (the Indian name of the hill back of 
 the old Meeting House in Marlborough,) and thence extending to 
 Whipsuppenicke, (a hill about a mile southeasterly of the former,) 
 and the neighboring parts. By this name, Whipsuppenicke, or 
 Whipsufferadge, as it was sometimes written, the English Planta- 
 tion of Marlborough was known, till its incorporation, in 1660. 
 
 Of the Indian Plantation at Marlborough, called, from the hill 
 abovenamed, Ockoocangansett, some account will be given here- 
 after. 
 
 A plan of the English plantation was made in May, 1667, by 
 Samuel Andrews, surveyor, which was approved by the Deputies, 
 17th 3mo. 1667. Wm. Torrey, Clerk. 
 
 Consented to by the Magistrates. Edward Rawson, Sec'y. 
 
 This plan was made on parchment on a scale of two inches to 
 a mile, and is now in the hands of Mr. Silas Gates of Marlborough. 
 
 The plantation contained by admeasurement 29,419 acres, which, 
 with the 6000 acres reserved for the Indians, of which we shall 
 presently speak, amounted to 35,419 acres. The Indian planting 
 field, on Ockoocangansett, the hill back of where the old meet- 
 ing house stood, was included within the bounds of the English 
 plantation, and formed a square containing about two hundred 
 acres. From the northwestern angle of this field the boundary line 
 between the Indian plantation on the east, and the English plan- 
 tation on the west, extends three miles north, seven degrees 
 west, to a point a little beyond the river Assabett*. From this 
 point the boundary line runs seven miles west, twenty five de- 
 grees south, (cutting off what is now the northwest angle of 
 Northborough, and which forms what are called the New Grants.) 
 Thence five miles south-southeast, to the south west extremity of 
 the plantation; thence two miles and three-fourths of a mile east, 
 nine degrees north, leading into Cedar swamp; thence southeast, 
 two hundred and fifty six rods on Sudbury River ; thence two miles 
 and three quarters, due east; thence two miles and one hundred 
 and twenty rods northeast, thirteen degrees north ; thence three 
 
 *This name is written and spoken variously by different persons. In the 
 report of the Canal Commissioners presented at the recent session of the Le- 
 gislature of this State, it is written Elsebeth, and is supposed to be a corrup- 
 tion of Elisabeth. By some aged persons, it is called Elsebeth. ; in Whitney's 
 Hist. Jlssabet. In the earliest records of Marlborough, however, it is almost 
 uniformly written with a final h, Jlsabeth or Assabelh. If either of the two 
 last letters are omitted, it should probably bt the t. In which case the name 
 would be Jlssabeh. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 7 
 
 hundred and forty eight rods north, seventeen degrees east; thence 
 one mile and three fourths of a mile due north, which reaches to 
 the Indian line ; then three miles, due west, on this line, which 
 completes the boundaries of the English plantation. 
 
 It would seem, from the above account, that the proprietors ex- 
 ceeded the limits of their grant by more than 6000 acres. We are 
 not to conclude, however, that they acted fraudulently in this bu- 
 siness ; since it appears that the draft of the plantation was present- 
 ed to the General Court for their acceptance, and approved by the 
 Deputies and Magistrates. 
 
 The form of the plantation was evidently regulated by a regard 
 to the surface and soil. Thus the boundary lines on the north and 
 west included all the meadows on the Assabeth, west of the Indian 
 plantation, and the extensive intervale, including several large 
 meadows and cedar swamps, which runs through nearly the whole 
 extent of iN"orthborough and VVestborough. The boundaries on the 
 south and ea^t were also fixed with the same sagacity and foresight. 
 
 It is said that the meadows, at the first settlement of our country, 
 produced much larger crops of grass, of a much better qualit}', than 
 at the present day. This circumstance, together with the difficul- 
 ty of subduing the uplands, will account for the eagerness manifest- 
 ed by the first settlers to possess a good supply of meadow grounds.* 
 
 The first meeting of the proprietors of the English plantation, 
 was holden 25th of the Vllth month (September) 1656.1 
 
 In 1657, the following eight names are found among the propri- 
 etors, in addition to the thirteen original petitioners above men- 
 tioned, making up the number of twenty one. 
 
 * It appears from the early records of Marlborough, that for many years 
 after its incorporation, the town 'was grtatly infested by wolves and rattle- 
 snakes. 
 
 In a single year, (1683) the town paid a bounty for no fewer than twenty 
 three wolves. In 1680, the following record was made. " Voted, to raise 
 thirteen men to go out to cil rattehnakes, eight to Cold Harbour-ward, and so 
 to the other place they cal boston, (now the northwestern corner of West- 
 borough) and five to Stoney Brook-ward, to the places thereabout. John 
 Brigham to cal out seven with him to the first, and Joseph Newton four with 
 him, to the latter, and they were to have two shillings apiece per day, paid 
 out of a town rates." 
 
 f'Sept. 25th- 1656. Upon amitinge of the petitioners apoynted to take 
 sum course to lay out the plantation granted to several inhabitants of Sudbu- 
 ry, it was ordered that all that doe take up lottes in that plantation shall pay 
 all publique charges that shall arise upon that plantation, according to their 
 house lottes and to be resident there in two years or set in a man that the 
 town shall aprove one, or else too loose their lotts ; but if God shall take 
 away any man by death, he have liberty to give his lott to whom he will." 
 
8 HISTORY OF NORTHEOROUUH. 
 
 William Kerly, Samuel Rice, Peter King, 
 
 John Rediat, John Johnson, Christopher Banister. 
 
 Solomon Johnson, Thomas Rice, 
 
 " At a meeting of the proprietors of this plantation the 26th of 
 Xber, (December) 1659. 
 
 u It is ordered that all such as lay clayme to any interest in this 
 new plantation at Wbipsuffe radge, (by the Indians called Whipsup- 
 penicke) are to perfect their house lots by the 25th of March next 
 insueing, or else to loose all their interest in the aforesaid planta- 
 tion." 
 
 Agreeably to this order, thirty eight house lots, including one 
 for a minister, and one for a smith, were set off, and granted to the 
 proprietors, the 26th of Nov. 1660. 
 
 Besides the persons already mentioned, the following had house 
 lots assigned to them, at this date. 
 
 Joseph Rice, Richard Ward, John Barrett, 
 
 John How, Jr. Benjamin Rice, Jos. Holmes, 
 
 Henry Kerley, John Bellows, Samuel How, 
 
 Richard Barns, Abraham How, Henry Axtell, 
 
 Andrew Belcher, Tho. Goodenow, Jr. John Newton. 
 
 Obediah Ward, John Rutter, 
 
 These thirty eight house lots, amounting in all to 992^ acres 
 consisted of some of the hest and most commodious tracts of land in 
 Marlborough. They contained from fifty to fifteen acres each, ac- 
 cording to the interest of the several proprietors in the plantation' 
 The principal part of the land, which was not taken up for house 
 lots, with the exception of Chauncey, (now Westborough and North- 
 borough,) was left common (called Cow Commons) to be disposed of 
 by subsequent grants. 
 
 The following boundaries were assigned to the Cow Commons in 
 1662. 
 
 " From John Alcocks line (now known by the name of the 
 Farm) to Stoney Brook ; thence up the brook to Crane Meadow, 
 and so along to Stirrup Meadow Brook, and to be extended as the 
 Brooke runs to Assibathe River, and down the said river till it 
 comes to the Indian line. This is, and shall remain a perpetual 
 Cow Com-rnon for the use of this town, never to bee altered with- 
 out the consent of all the inhabitants and proprietors thereof at a 
 full meeting ; excepting four score acres of upland this town hath 
 reserved within the aforesaid tract of land to accommodate some 
 such desirable persons withall as need may require, opportunity 
 present, and the town accept." 
 
HISTORY OV NORTHEOROUGH. 
 
 A vote was passed at a meeting of the proprietors in 1705, to 
 divide the Cow Commons among the original proprietors and such 
 as had acquired rights in the plantation, in proportion to the first 
 
 grants. 
 
 So early as 1660, it appears that measures had been adopted by 
 the proprietors of Marlborough, for the maintenance of public wor- 
 ship ; and that Mr. William Brimsmead, afterwards ordained as 
 their pastor, was employed as a preacher. 
 
 In the following year, they voted to build a house for their 
 minister; and, in 1662, the frame of a house, with the house lot on 
 which it stood, were granted to Wm. Brimsmead, Minister.* 
 
 In 1662, a rate was made of 12 pence per acre upon all house 
 lots for building a Meeting House ; and again, in 1664, of 3J pence 
 per acre for finishing the house. This house, which was after- 
 wards burnt by the Indians, stood on the old common, within the 
 limits of the Indian planting field, which, Hutchinson says, "caused 
 great disputes and discouragements."! 
 
 It appears from the following record, that the land on which 
 the Meeting House was erected was afterwards purchased of an 
 Indian, whose title to the land was probably disputed by his breth- 
 ren of the Indian Plantation. 
 
 " 1663, April 4. Anamaks, an Indian of Whipsuppenicke, for 
 divers reasons and considerations, sold to John Ruddock and John 
 How, for the use of the town of Marlborough, the land that the 
 Meeting House now stands on — also the land for the highway on 
 the fore side of said Meeting House, and so upon a square of ten 
 feet, round about the said Meeting House." This land, with the 
 addition of half an acre purchased in 1688. of Daniel, Samuel, and 
 Nathaniel Gookin, sons of Maj. Gen. Daniel Gookin, of Cambridge, 
 constitutes what is now the old common, the whole of which did 
 
 *The house built for Mr. Brimsmead stood on the lot of land west of Ock- 
 oocangansett, not far from the spot on which the old Meeting House was af- 
 terwards erected. There is a tradition tbat Mr. Brimsmead's house was set 
 on fire by the Indians in King Philip's war, and that the flames communicated 
 with the Meeting House, which was the occasion of its being burnt. 
 
 It may be interesting to the antiquary to learn the form and dimensions of 
 a dwelling house erected more than 160 years since. It was 36 ft. by Iff ft. 
 and 12£ ft. high between the joints. It had four windows in front, and two 
 at the west end. It had besides two gables in front, 10 ft. wide and 8 ft. 
 square, (projecting 8 ft.) with two small windows on the front side of the ga- 
 bles. It was built by contract for £15, to be paid in corn ; one third wheat, 
 one third rye, and one third Indian corn. Wheat at 4s. Gd. rye at 4*. and 
 Indian com at 3s. per bushel. For the payment of this sum, a rate was made 
 of 7-J pence per acre upon all house lots in the Plantation. 
 
 t Hist. Col, I. p. 167. 
 
10 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 not come into the possession of the town till 1706, when the half 
 acre above mentioned was purchased by Abraham Williams and 
 Joseph Rice, "for the use of the town, to set a Meeting House on." 
 
 Till 1675, nothing serious appears to have occurred to inter- 
 rupt the prosperity of the inhabitants of this flourishing settlement. 
 But their prosperity received a severe check in the war which 
 now ensued. After the destruction of Lancaster, (Feb. 10, 1676, 
 O. S.) a party of the enemy directed their course through Marlbo- 
 rough, where they committed some depredations, on their way to 
 Sudbury and Medfield, in the latter of which places nearly 50 dwel- 
 ling houses were burnt, and 15 persons lost their lives. 
 
 A second attack was made upon the English settlement at Marl- 
 borough, on the 20th of the following month, which, though no 
 lives were lost, was attended with more disastrous consequences. 
 It was Lord's day ; and the inhabitants were assembled for public 
 worship, when the preacher, the Rev. Mr. Brimsmead, was inter- 
 rupted in the midst of his discourse by the appalling cry, that the 
 Indians were advancing upon them. The Assembly instantly dis- 
 persed ; and, with a single exception,* succeeded in reaching the 
 neighboring garrison house in safety before the enemy came up. 
 But though they defended themselves, they could afford no protection 
 to their property, much of which was wasted or destroyed. Their 
 Meeting House and many of their dwelling houses were burned to 
 the ground ; their fruit trees hacked and pilled ; their cattle killed 
 or maimed, so that marks of their ravages were visible for many 
 vears. 
 
 The alarm occasioned by this attack, and the defenceless state 
 to which the inhabitants were reduced, led them to retire from the 
 place, and to seek shelter in a more populous neighborhood. Short- 
 ly after the close of the war, which lasted little more than a year, 
 they returned to their farms, and were permitted for many years 
 to cultivate them in peace.! 
 
 * The person to -whom allusion is here made was Moses Newton, grand- 
 father of the late Deac. Paul Newton, of this town. Being detained behind 
 the rest in the benevolent attempt to rescue an aged and infirm female, who 
 would otherwise have been exposed to certain destruction, he received a ball 
 in his elbow, which deprived him in a measure of the use of his arm ever af- 
 ter. Solomon Newton, a grandson of the above, is now living:, (1826) aged 
 92 years, with his son, Willard Newton, Esq. in Southborough, on the farm 
 taken up by his great-grand-father, Richard Newton, nearly 170 years ago. 
 Richard came from England, and was one of the 13 original proprietors of 
 Marlborough. Richard had three sons, Moses, Ezekiel and John. Moses 
 was the father of eight sons and two daughters, viz. Moses, Jonathan, James. 
 Josiah, David, Edward, Hannah, Mercy, Jacob, and Ebenezer. 
 
 t There are no records in the Proprietors 1 Books of what took place be- 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 1 1 
 
 Soon after their return, they proceeded to the erection of a new- 
 Meeting House, which, like the former, was thatched with straw, 
 or rather a species of tall grass, taken from the meadow since cal- 
 led, from that circumstance, Thatch Meadow. This building, which 
 was left in an unfinished state, lasted but a few years. In 1680, an 
 unsuccessful attempt was made to enlarge and repair it; and at 
 length, in 1688, a larger and more commodious house was erected, 
 near the site of the former, which lasted more than one hundred 
 and twenty years, having stood till the new Meeting House in the 
 east Parish was erected, in 1809.* 
 
 Prior to the year 1684, it appears that nothing effectual had 
 been done towards purchasing a title to the land " cleare of the In- 
 dians, who were continually making demands upon the towne." The 
 Plantation was commenced under the auspices of the Gen. Court ; 
 and, as 6000 acres, bordering upon this Plantation, had been re- 
 served by order of the Court, for the use of the Indians, nothing 
 further seems to have been thought necessary for many years, 
 either by the English or the Indians, to give the former a perfect 
 title to their lands. It was not indeed till the Indian Plantation was 
 broken up, and most of the inhabitants dispersed, that the Indians 
 of Natick and Wamesit, (now a part of Tewksbury,) who belong- 
 ed to the same tribe with the Marlborough Indians, put in their 
 claims to a right in the soil which had been cultivated by the En- 
 glish now for nearly 30 years. 
 
 At length, in the winter of 1684, a Committee of three persons 
 
 Iween May, 1675, and July, 1677. It appears that the inhabitants had re- 
 turned some time before the latter date. It appears from the Records of the 
 General Court, that preparations for defence against the Indians had been 
 made as early as 1670. lt Ordered, that the Surveyor General shall forth- 
 with deliver unto Maj. Hathorn, or to Lieut. Samuel Ward, 60 great shot, fit 
 for the guns in the Fort at Marlborough. A Fort was maintained there through 
 the war. 
 
 * The old Meeting House was valued, in 1689, at £10 ; the pulpit at £4, 
 ■•'which were improved in ihe new Meeting House for carrying on the finishing 
 of that." — It would appear, from the following vote, which passed with great 
 uuanimity at a meeting of the proprietors, May 21, 1638, that there had been 
 some controversy respecting the location of the new Meeting House, and that 
 it was even then in contemplation to divide the town into two parishes. 
 
 k ' Voted, That if the westerly part of the town shall see cause afterwards 
 to build another Meeting House, and find themselves able so to do, and main- 
 tain a minister ; then the division to be made by a line at the cart-way at 
 Stirrup Brook, where Coaecticot way now goeth over, (now within the limits 
 of Northborough.) and so to run a parallel line with the west line of the 
 bounds of the town."'' It would seem highly probable, from this vote, that 
 vhcre were inhabitants then living west of the line thus defined, and which 
 was afterwards (1717) made the b<^:rst'ary line between Marlborough and 
 W< tstboraugb. 
 
22 HISTORY OF NOIU'HEOROUGH. 
 
 was appointed by the town to treat with the Indians ; who, April 
 17th and 18th, with the help of Maj. Peter Bulkley and Capt. 
 Thomas Hincksman, made a bargain that the town should pay them 
 £31 for a deed in full. The town accepted the conditions, and 
 agreed to bring in the money, (assessed upon the proprietors, 
 now 50 in number,) to the Meeting House, on the 20th of May next, 
 which was accordingly done, and the deed signed by the Indians 
 presented to the town, who directed that it should be kept by Abra- 
 ham Williams, as also the plat of the plantation made by Samuel 
 Andrews, of which an account has already been given. 
 
 A Copy of the Indian Deed of the Plantation of Marlborough. 
 "To all Christian people to whom these presents shall come, Greet- 
 ing 
 
 KNOW YEE, That we, the Indian inhabitants of the Planta- 
 tions called Natick and Wamesit," (now part of Tewksbury,) "in the 
 Massachusetts Colonie, in New England, namely," (the names of 
 the grantees are written below, with the omission of Andrew Pilim 
 or Pitimee, and John Wamesqut, and the addition of Edmund Aso- 
 wonit, making the whole number 25,) "for and in consideration of 
 the sum of thirty one pounds of lawful money of New England, 
 which said sum, wee the said" (here the names are repeated,) "do 
 acknowledge ourselves to have received of Abraham Williams and 
 Joseph Rice, both of the town of Marlborough, in the County of 
 Middlesex, in New England, who, in the said payment, not only for 
 themselves, but also as agents in behalf of all the rest of their fel- 
 low purchasers, belonging to the said town ©f Marlborough, and of 
 the said sum of thirty one pounds, and of every part and parcel 
 thereof, wee the said" (names repeated) "for ourselves, and for our 
 heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns, do freely, clearly, and 
 wholly, exonerate, acquit, and discharge the said Abraham Wil- 
 liams and Joseph Rice and all their said fellow purchasers belong- 
 ing to the said town of Marlborough, and every of them, and their 
 heirs, executors, administrators, and every of them forever; have 
 given, granted, bargained, sold, and by these presents, do give, 
 grant, bargain, sell, and confirm, unto the said Abraham Williams 
 and Joseph Rice, and unto all their fellow purchasers, belonging to 
 the said Town of Marlborough, and unto all and every of their sev- 
 eral heirs and assigns forever, all that tract of land, which is con- 
 tained within the bounds of the Town, Township, or Plantation, 
 called Marlborough aforesaid, as the said bounds were laid out, 
 plotted and represented by Mr. Samuel Andrews, of Cambridge, un- 
 
HJST0RY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 13 
 
 to the Court of the Massachusetts Colonie aforesaid, and by the 
 said Court accepted and recorded, that is to say all Uplands 3 
 Meadows, Swamps, Woods, Timber, Fountains, Brooks, Rivers, 
 Ponds, and Herbage, within the said bounds of the said Town, 
 Township, or Plantation of Marlborough, together with all and sin- 
 gular the appurtenances thereof, and all manner of profits, gains, 
 and advantages, arising upon, or from, the said tract of land, which 
 the said Abraham Williams, or Joseph Rice, or all, or any of their 
 fellow purchasers, belonging to the town of Marlborough afore- 
 said, at any time formerly had, or now have, or hereafter at any 
 time may, or shall have ; (except a certain farm, some years ago 
 laid out unto Mr. John Alcock, deceased, which lyeth within the. 
 bounds of said town or township of Marlburrough, and is by us, the 
 said" [names repeated] "utterly and totally exempted and excluded 
 from this present bargain.) To have and to hold all the foremeu- 
 tioned tract of land" (here the description is repeated) "to their own 
 proper use and improvement, as is above declared, (except the 
 farm before excepted,) to themselves, the said Abraham Williams 
 and Joseph Rice, and to all their said fellow purchasers, belonging 
 to the said Marlburrough, and unto all and several their heirs and as- 
 signs forever, in a good and sure estate of inheritance, in fee sim- 
 ple, without any claims or demands, any obstruction, eviction, ex- 
 pulsion, or molestation whatsoever, from us the said" (names re- 
 peated,) "or from the heirs, executors, administrators, or assigns of 
 us the said Indians, or either of us, or from any other person or 
 persons whatsoever, acting by, from, or under us or them, or any 
 of them, our said heirs, executors, administrators, or assigns. Fur- 
 thermore, wee, the said" (names repeated) "do covenant and grant, 
 with, and too, the said Abraham Williams and Joseph Rice, and all 
 their said fellow purchasers, belonging to said Marlburrough, that 
 wee, the above named Indians, have been, until the conveyance 
 and assurance made by these presents, the true and proper owners 
 of all the said tract of land, lying within the bounds of the planta- 
 tion or township of Marlburrough, together with all and singular 
 the appurtenances thereof, in our own right, and to our own use, 
 in a good absolute and firm estate of inheritance, in fee simple, and 
 have full power, good right, and lawful authority to grant, bar- 
 gain, sell, conveigh, and assure, the said tract of land, and every 
 part and parcel thereof, with all and singular the appurtenances of 
 the same, as is before, in these presents, mentioned ; and wee, the 
 said" (names repeated) "do warrant and assure that all the tract of 
 
14 
 
 HISTORY OP NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 land, and ali and every the appurtenances thereof, by these pres-~ 
 ents, alienated and sold, have been and are at the time of signing 
 and sealing of this Deed of sale, utterly and totally free, and clear 
 from any former bargains, sales, gifts, grants, leases, mortgages, 
 judgments, executions, extents, and incumbrances whatsoever; and 
 wee, the said" (names repeated) "for ourselves, and our heirs, exec- 
 utors, administrators, and assigns, do, and shall, from time to time, 
 and at all times hereafter, (as occasion shall be offered) confirm, 
 defend, and make good, unto all intents and purposes, this whole 
 bargain and sale aforesaid, and unto all and several their heirs and 
 assigns forever. In witness of all which premises, wee, the said" 
 (names repeated) "have hereunto set our hands and seals, this 
 twelfth day of June, in the year of our Lord Christ, one thousand 
 six hundred, eighty and four, Annoq. Regni Regis Caroli Secundi 
 XXXVI. 
 
 Andrew Pilim (Pitimee) 
 
 Attorney to old F. JVaban. 
 signum 
 John X Nasquanet 
 
 signum 
 William X Wononatomog 
 
 signum 
 John [*< Speen 
 signum 
 Lawrence ^ Nowsawane 
 
 signum 
 Jacob X Ponopohquin 
 
 his mark 
 Jeremy X Sosoohquoh 
 
 his mark 
 Samuel ^ William 
 
 signum 
 Nathaniel ^ Quonkatohn 
 James Speen 
 
 signum 
 John ><* Wamesqut 
 
 signum 
 Job X Pohpono 
 
 his mark 
 Benjamin ><< Tray 
 
 his mark 
 Sosowun ><; noo 
 
 James x Wiser 
 Simon Betogkom 
 
 "June 11th and 12th, 1C84. 
 
 his mark 
 Great ><; John 
 Thomas Waban 
 his mark 
 Abraham >- Speen 
 
 his mark 
 Great x James 
 
 signum 
 Jacob X Petowat 
 
 signum 
 Jehoja X kin 
 
 signum 
 Peter X Ephraim 
 
 Attorney for Jno. Awoosarnug. 
 
 signum 
 John x Awoosamug 
 
 signum 
 Thorn. X Dublet 
 
 signum 
 Benjamin B Boho. 
 
 Signed, sealed, and delivered, in pre- 
 sence of us witnesses, 
 
 Simon Crosby 
 John Curtis 
 his mark 
 Henry X Rice 
 John Magus | 
 
 Tt • i m i -ir i Indians. 
 
 Daniel lakawompaitj 
 
 At a Court held at Natick among 
 the Indians, there appeared in Court, and before me, all the seal- 
 ers and subscribers to this deed, being twenty five (there are twen- 
 
HISTORY OF NORTIIEOROUGH. 1 9 
 
 ty six signatures) persons in number, and freely acknowledged this 
 writing to be their act and deed." 
 
 "As Attests, Daniel Gookin, SerCr Assistant." 
 
 "This Deed entered in the Register at Cambridge. Lib. 9. page 
 293—299. 7. 2. 85. By Tho : Danforth, ft." 
 
 It will be seen from the above signatures, that, besides the two 
 Indian witnesses, John Magus and Daniel Takawompait, four oth- 
 ers, viz. Andrew Pitimee, James Speen, Simon Betogkom, ;md 
 Thomas Waban, wrote their own names. Daniel Takawompait, 
 or Tokkohwompait, was a pastor of the church in Natick, in 1698, 
 ordained by the Rev. and holy man of God, John Eliot. He is 
 said to have been a person of great knowledge.* Thomas Waban 
 was probably a son of old Waban, the first Indian convert in Mas- 
 sachusetts, and one who supported a consistent christian character 
 till his death, which happened in 1674, at the age of 70.f Maj. 
 Gen. Daniel Gookin, before whom the deed was acknowledged, 
 was the friend and fellow laborer of Eliot, an enlightened, virtu- 
 ous, and benevolent magistrate. He belonged to Cambridge, 
 where he died in 1687, aged 75. 
 
 Two others, whose names are affixed to this instrument, viz, 
 John Speen, and John Awoosamug, are mentioned in the account 
 of Dochester.J The former of whom, it appears, was for some 
 time a teacher, till he became addicted to intemperance, when he 
 was laid aside. The latter, though he had been propounded to 
 join the church, had been excluded on account of his quick and pas- 
 sionate temper, but discovered marks of penitence during his last 
 sickness, which satisfied the scruples of his brethren. 
 
 The Indian Plantation of Ockoocangansett,§ or Marlboreugh. 
 
 Some time previous to the commencement of the English Plan- 
 tation, as appears from the following order of the General Court, 
 the Indians had a grant of a township in that place. 
 
 " In reference to the case between Mr. Eliot, in behalf of the 
 Indians of Qguonikongquamesit, and Sudbury men: the Courte find- 
 ing that the Indians had agraunt of a township in the place before 
 
 * Seel Hist. Col. X. 134. 1 1 Hist. Col. V. 263. J 1 Hist. Col. IX. 198. 
 
 { 1 have given the name as it is uniformly written in the earliest records 
 of Marlborough. Hutchinson, quoting from Eliot, who visited the place in 
 1670, writes it Ogguonikongquamesut ; Gookin, who wrote in 1674, Okomma- 
 kamesit. The word has since been corrupted into Agogangjpmisset. This 
 name, it should be considered, was at first appropriated to the Indian Planta- 
 tion, while the English Plantation, before its incorporation in 1660, was called 
 Whipsuppenicke. Both plantations were, however, in 167<J, called by the 
 same name by Daniel Gookin. 
 
16 
 
 HISTORY OF RORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 the English, the Courte determines and orders, that Mr. Edward 
 Jackson, Mr. Tho. Danforth, Mr. Ephraim Child andCapt. Lusher,* 
 or any three of them, as a committee, shall with the first conven- 
 ient opportunity, if it may be before winter, lay out a township in 
 the said place, of 6000 acres, to the Indians in which, at least, shall 
 bee three or four hundred acres of meadow ; and in case there be 
 enough left for a convenient township for the Sudbury men, to lay 
 it out to them; the grant of Mr. Alcock's (842 acres granted in 1655) 
 confirmed by the last Court out of both excepted and reserved, .and 
 the Indians to have the Hill on which they are, and the rest of the 
 land to be laid out adjoining to it as may be convenient to both 
 plantations. "t 
 
 The Hill mentioned in this order, had been improved for many 
 years by the Indians, probably long before the arrival of the Eng- 
 lish, as a planting field. It was afterwards, in 1677, as appears 
 from the following instrument, conveyed to Daniel Gookin, Esq. 
 
 * Know all men by these presents that we old Nequain, Robin 
 called old Robin, Benjamin Wuttanamit, James called Great James, 
 John Nasquamit, Sarah the widow of Peter Nasquament, in behalf 
 of her child Moses David, next heir to my father and to my uncle 
 Josiah Harding, deceased, without issue, Assoask the widow of Jo- 
 siah Nowell, in behalf of my children, Sarah Conomog, sole exex- 
 utrix to my late husband, Conomog, Elizabeth, the only daughter 
 and heir of Solomon, deceased," [Solomon had been the teacher of 
 the Indians of Marlborough,] "James Spene, in behalf of my wife, 
 being all of us, true proprietors, possessors and improvers of the 
 Indian lands called Whipsufferage, alias Okonkonomesit, adjoining 
 to Marlborough in the colony of Massachusetts in New England 
 for divers considerations us thereunto moving, especially the love 
 and duty we owe to our honored magistrate, Daniel Gookin, of 
 Cambridge, Esq. who hath been a ruler to us above 20 years, do 
 hereby freely and absolutely give, grant and confirm, unto him the 
 said Daniel Gookin, Esq. and his heirs forever, one parcel of land 
 heretofore broken up, and being planted by us and our predeces- 
 sors, called by the name of Okonkonomesit Hill, situate, lying and 
 being on the south side of our township and plantation, near Marl- 
 borough, containing about one hundred acres, more or less, (also 
 ten acres in Fort Meadow, and ten in Long Meadow,) with free 
 
 * These three, Danforth, Child, and Lusher, were respectively deputies 
 !o the General Court from Cambridge, Watertown, and Dedham, in 1657. 
 
 t Records of the General Court for the ytar 1658-9. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 17 
 
 liberty of commonage for wood, timber, feeding of bis cattle, upon 
 
 any common land, within our township or plantation." 
 
 "Second day of May, 1677. 
 
 Signed, sealed, and delivered in presence of us, 
 
 John Eliot, Waban X his mark, 
 
 Noah Wiswell, Piamboo X his mark, 
 
 Joshaa Woods, Joseph Wheeler. 
 
 Acknowledged before me, 
 
 Thomas Danforth, Jlssistct7it. 
 
 Entered and recorded at the Registry at Cambridge.*" 
 
 It is thus described by Gookin in 1674. " In this Indian Plan- 
 tation there is a piece of fertile land, containing above 150 acres, 
 upon which the Indians have, not long since, lived, and planted 
 several apple trees thereupon, which bear abandance of fruit; 
 but now the Indians are removed from it about a mile. This 
 tract of land doth so embosom itself into the English town, that it 
 is encompassed about with it, except one way; and upon the edge 
 of this land the English have placed their Meeting House." It was 
 a favorite design of the benevolent Gookin, which he proposed in 
 his Historical Collections, " as an expedient for civilizing the In- 
 dians, and propagating the Gospel among them," to have this tract 
 of land, which, with certain meadows and woodland, he says, "is well 
 worth £200 in money, set apart for an Indian free school ; and 
 there to build a convenient house for a school master and his fami- 
 ly, and under the same roof may be a room for a school." This, 
 with the necessary out buildings, he computes will not cost more 
 than £200 in money ; and the use of the land, he thinks, will be an 
 adequate compensation for the services of the school master. 
 
 " Moreover, it is very nrobable," he adds, " that the English 
 people of Marlborough will gladly and readily send their children 
 to the same school, and pay the school master for them, which will 
 better his maintenance ; for they have no school in that place at 
 the present." 
 
 We learn further from this account that the number of families 
 in Marlborough, at this period, did not amount to fifty, every vil- 
 lage containing that number being required by the laws to provide 
 a school "to teach the English tongue, and to write." "These 
 
 *May 1C, 1682. Waban, Piamboo, Great James, Thomas Tray, and 
 John Wincols, proprietors of the Indian Plantation of Whipsufferadge, grant- 
 ed to Samuel Gookin, of Cambridge, liberty to erect a Saw Mill upon any 
 brook or run of water within the said Plantation, with land Mot exceeding 
 three acres, n«e of timber, &c. for 30 years, 
 
18 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUCfft. 
 
 people of Marlborough," says he, somewhat indignantly, "wanting 
 a few of fifty families, do take that low advantage to ease their 
 purses of this common charge." 
 
 What reception this proposal met with, we are not informed. 
 It was most certainly an expedient that promised the happiest con- 
 sequences, and worthy of the liberal and philanthropic mind of its 
 author. How close is the resemblance between this plan, conceiv- 
 ed more than one hundred and fifty years since, and that of the 
 Indian schools recently established at Brainerd, Eliot, Mayhew, 
 and other places in the United States ?* 
 
 The people of Marlborough, notwithstanding the severity of 
 Gookin's censure, have not been behind other towns in New En- 
 gland in their attention to schools. Owing to the troubles which 
 ensued, soon after the date of Gookin's Historical Collections, they 
 felt themselves unable to meet the expense of a public school for 
 several following years. At length, however, in 1698, Benjamin 
 Franklinj was employed as a school master in Marlborough, from 
 the first of November, 1696, to the last of March, 1697, at eight 
 shillings per week ; " he engaging carefully to teach all such youth 
 as com or are sent to him, to read English once a day, att least, or 
 more, if need require ; also to learn to write and cast accounts." 
 The school was kept in Isaac Wood's house, which was then un- 
 occupied. 
 
 * 1 Hist. Col. I. p. 220. 
 
 + This person was probably an uncle of Doctor Benjamin Franklin. In 
 the first volume of Franklin's Works, edited by his grandson, William Tem- 
 ple Franklin, page 6, is the following account of the person referred to above. 
 u My grandfather had four sons, who grew up, viz: Thomas, John, Benjamin 
 and Josiah. Benjamin was bred a silk dyer, serving an apprenticeship in Lon- 
 don. He was an ingenious man. I remember, when I was a boy, he came 
 to my father's, in Boston, and resided in the house with us for several years. 
 There was always a particular affection between my father and him, and I 
 was his godson. He lived to a great age. He left behind him two quarto 
 volumes of manuscript of his own poetry, consisting of fugitive pieces addres- 
 sed to his friends. He had invented a shorthand of his own, which he taught 
 nie, but not having practiced it, I have now forgotten it. He was very pious, 
 and zn assiduous attendant at the sermons of the best preachers, which he 
 reduced to writing according to his method, and had thus collected several 
 volumes of them. He was also a good deal of a politician ; too much so, per- 
 haps, for his station. There fell lately into my possession, in London, a col- 
 lection he made of all the principal political pamphlets relating to public af- 
 fairs, from the year 1G41 to 1717; many of the volumes are wanting, as ap- 
 pears, by their numbering; but there still remains eight volumes in folio, and 
 twenty in quarto and octavo. A dealer iu old books had met with them, and 
 knowing me by name, having bought, books of him, he brought them to me. 
 It would appear that my uncle must have left them here, when he went to 
 America, which was about fifty years a,^'o. I found several of his notes in the 
 margins. His grandson, Samuel Franklin, is still living in Bosto:;."' 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 19 
 
 Jan. 10, 1698-9. The town voted to build a school house. Af- 
 ter this, Mr. Jonathan Johnson was employed as a school master 
 for many years in succession. 
 
 The Indian Plantation was laid out agreeably to the following report 
 of the Commissioners appointed as aforesaid. 
 
 "WmpsurPENicKE the 19th of june, 1659. 
 "The Committee appointed hy the Gen. Court to lay out a Plan- 
 tation for the Indians of 6000 acres at the above named place, hav- 
 ing given Mr. Eliot* a meeting and duly weighed all his exceptions 
 in the behalf of the Indians; first, what hath beene formerly acted 
 and returned to the Gen. Court, do judge meete in way of comply- 
 ance, that the bounds of the Indian Plantation bee enlarged unto 
 the most westerly part of the fence, that now standeth on the 
 west side of th.e Hill or planting field called Ockoocangansett, and 
 from thence to bee extended on a direct north line untill they have 
 their full quantity of 6000 acres: the bounds of their Plantation in 
 all other respects, wee jud°:e meete that they stand as in the form 
 returned ; and that their full complement of meadow by Court 
 Grant, may stand and bee exactly measured out by an artist within 
 the limits of the aforesaid lines, when the Indians, or any in their 
 behalf, are willing to be at the charges thereof : provided alwaies 
 that the Indi ns may have noe power to make sale thereof, of all 
 or any part of their abovesaid lands, otherwise than by the consent 
 of the Hon 4 Gen 1 Court ; or when any shall be made or happen, 
 the Plantation of English there seated may have the first tender 
 of it from the Court ; which caution wee the rather insert, because 
 not only a considerable part of the nearest and best planting land 
 is heereby taken away from the English (as we are informed) but 
 the nearest and best part of their meadow, by estimation about an 
 hundred acres in one place, that this north line doth take away, 
 which tendeth much to the detrimenting of the English Plantation, 
 especially if the lands should bee impropriated to any other use 
 than the Indians proposed, that is to say, for an Indian Plantation, 
 or for the accommodating their Plantation, they should bee depriv- 
 ed thereof." 
 
 Signed by 
 
 F.LEAZICR LUSHER, 
 
 EDWARD JACKSON, {cnnmitrioneri 
 
 EPHRAIM CHILD, 
 
 THOMAS DANFORTH, 
 
 * The celebrated John Eliot, minister of Roxbury, commonly called the 
 Apostle of the Indians. 
 
 3 
 
20 . HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 The account given of this Plantation by Capt. afterwards, Maj. 
 Gen. Gookin, of Cambridge, who visited it in 1674, more than one 
 hundred and fifty years since, will be interesting to these who have 
 not already seen it. 
 
 " Okommakatnesit, alias Marlborough, is situated about twelve 
 miles north northeast from Hassanamesitt, (Grafton) about thirty 
 miles from Boston westerty. 
 
 "This village contains about ten families, and consequently about 
 fifty souls. The quantity of land appertaining to it is six thousand 
 acres. It is much of it good land, and yieldeth plenly of corn, be- 
 ing well husbanded. It is sufficiently stored with meadow, and is 
 well wooded and watered. It hath several good orchards upon it, 
 planted by the Indians: and is in itself a very good plantation. 
 This town doth join so near to the English of Marlborough, that it 
 (we might apply to it what) was spoken of David in type and our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, the antitype, " Under his shadow ye shall re- 
 joice :" but the Indians here do not much rejoice under the English- 
 men's shadow ; who do so overtop them in their number of people, 
 stocks of cattle, &c. that the Indians do not greatly flourish, or de- 
 light in their station at present. 
 
 "Their ruler here was Onomog, who is lately deceased, about 
 two months since ; which is a great blow to that place. He was a 
 pious and discreet man, and the very soul as it were of that place. 
 Their teacher's name is **** Here they observe the same decorum 
 for religion and civil order, as is done in other towns. They have 
 a constable and other officers, as the rest have. The Lord sancti- 
 fy the present affliction they are under by reason of their bereave- 
 ments ; and raise up others, and give them grace to promote relig- 
 ion and good order among them." 
 
 From this account, which is given by an eye witness, it is pretty 
 evident that a spirit of jealousy and envy against their more pros- 
 perous neighbors of the English Plantation, was even then rankling 
 in their hearts: and we are not much surprised to learn that, in the 
 calamitous war which broke out in the following year between the 
 English and Indians, known by the name of King Philip's war, some 
 of these half civilized sons of the forest were found among the en- 
 emy, at the place of their general rendezvous, in the western part 
 of Worcester County, a few days previous to their desolating march 
 
 *Hutchinson says his name was Solomon, judged to be a serious and sound 
 Christian, p. 167. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 21 
 
 through the country, in which Lancaster, and many other towns, 
 experienced the honors of savage warfare.* 
 
 * James Quanipaug, who was sent out with another Indian by the name 
 of Job to reconnoitre the enemy, then in the Western part oi this County, in 
 the beginning of 1676, passed through iiassanamesit (Grafton) thence to 
 Manexit, (a part of Woodstock) where he was taken by seven Indians and 
 carried to vleuimesseg, (.New Braintree) where he found many of the enemy, 
 and among them " tiie Marlborough Indians who pretended that they had been 
 fetched away by the other Indians. 11 Some of them professed to be willing to 
 return. Philip is said at this time to have been about half a day's journey on 
 the other side of Fort Orania, (Albany) and the Hadley Indians on this side. 
 They were then preparing for that memorable expedition, in which the towns 
 of Lancaster, Groton, Marlborough, Sudbury, and Medfield, were destroyed. 
 
 The letter of James Quanipaug bears date 24th : II mo: 1675. (Jan. 
 24, 1676.) It was only 16 days after this, viz. Feb. 10th O. S. that they 
 made a descent upon Lancaster, with 1500 warriors, and butchered or carried 
 into captivity nearly all the inhabitants of that flourishing village. 
 
 Whether the Marlborough Indians joined in this expedition, or left the 
 enemy and returned to their homes, I have not been able after diligent en- 
 quiry to ascertain. The little that I have been able to collect, though cor- 
 roborated by circumstantial evidence, rests mainly on tradition. 
 
 Though it appears from the testimony of James Quanipaug that the 
 Marlborough Indians were with Philip's men at Menimesseg, it is by no 
 means certain that all who belonged to the Plantation had gone over to the 
 enemy. Tradition says, that those who remained at home were suspected of 
 treachery, and that representations to that effect were made to the governor, 
 (Leverett) who dispatched a company of soldiers under the command of 
 Capt. Mosely, to convey them to Boston. They reached Marlborough, it is 
 said, in the night ; and early in the morning, before the Indians had any sus- 
 picion of their design, surrounded the fort to which they were accustomed to 
 repair at night, si< zed on their arms, and obliged them to surrender. They 
 attempted no resistance, and it is by no means certain that they entertained 
 any hostile designs against the English. They were, however, taken into the 
 custody of the soldiers ; and, having their hands fastened behind their backs, 
 and then being connected together by means of a cart rope, they were in this 
 manner driven down to Boston, whence it is probable, that they were convey- 
 ed, in company with the Indians of Natick and other places, to one of the is- 
 lands in the harbor, and kept in durance till the close of the war. 
 
 This tradition is corroborated by the following circumstances. 
 
 In the account of Daniel Gookin, in 1 Hist. Col. 1, 228, it is said that 
 " some instances of perfidy in Indians, who had professed themselves friendly, 
 excited suspicions against all their tribes. The General Court of Massachu- 
 setts passed several severe laws against them ; and the Indians of Natick and 
 other places, who had subjected themselves to the English government, were 
 hurried down to Long Island (Hutchinson says Deer Island,) in the harbor 
 of Boston, where they remained all winter, and endured inexpressible hard- 
 ships. 11 We learn further from Hutchinson, that the Indians of Punkapog 
 alone (now Stoughton) were exempted from this severity of treatment. The 
 ground of the harsh measures adopted in reference to the Indians in the 
 neighborhood of Boston, was, the perfidious conduct of the Springfield Indians, 
 in assisting in the destruction of Westfield, Hadley, and other places, in Octo- 
 ber 1675. "This instance of perfidy,' 1 says Hutchinson, ''seems to have in- 
 creased the jealousies and suspicions, which had before begun of the Indians 
 round Boston, viz. Punkapog, Natick, &c." 
 
 At the session, in October, the General Court ordered " that no person 
 shall entertain, own, or countenance any Indian under the penalty of being a. 
 betrayer of this government. 11 
 
 " That a guard be set at the entrance of the town of Boston, a id that no 
 
22 
 
 HISTORY OF NORTHEOROUGH. 
 
 This war, if calamitous to the English, proved fatal to nearly 
 all the Indian Plantations in New England. Among the rest ihe 
 
 Indian be suffered to enter upon any pretence without a guard of two mus- 
 keteer?, and not to lodge in town." 
 
 "That any person may apprehend an Indian, finding him in town, or ap- 
 proaching; the town, and that none be suffered to come in by water.'" 
 
 To this we may add, that Capt. Mosely's character was such as to render 
 it highly probable that he perfor/ied the part which tradition has assigned to 
 him. Hutchinson says, "•he had been an old privateerer at Jamaica, proba- 
 bly of such as were called Buccaniers," He commanded a company of 110 
 Tohinteers, in the war with King Philip, and was one of the most resolute 
 and courageous captains of his day. It was he who, on Sept. 1, 1675, went 
 out to the rescue of Capt. Lathrop, who with only 80 men was attacked by 
 a body of 7 or 8 hundred Indians at Ueerfield, wh. n all Capt. L's company, 
 with the exception of seven or eight, were cut off. He also led the van in 
 the terrible assault made upon the Indians, Dec. 19, in the Narragansett 
 country, in which six English captains were killed, and nearly 200 men kil- 
 led and wounded. 
 
 I hope I shall be pardoned for adding to this already extended note, the 
 following particulars respecting the remains of the Marlborough Indians. 
 
 After the close of the war, some of the Indians of Marlboro i-gh appear to 
 have returned to their former place of abode. But their plantation was brok- 
 en up, and they were forced to find shelter and subsistence as they were able. 
 
 A considerable number of the Indians who remained in, or returned to, 
 Marlborough, after the war, lived in the westerly pait of the town, on the 
 farm of Thomas Brigham, one of the oldest proprietors, the common ancestor 
 of all the Brighams in this town, as well as of many of that name in Marlbo- 
 rough, Westborough, and other places. The late Judge Brigham, of West- 
 borough, and Rev. Benjamin Brigham, of Fitzwilliam, were great-grandsons 
 of Thomas. 
 
 Among those who returned was David, alias David Munnanaw, who had 
 joined Philip, and as he afterwards confessed, assisted in the destruction of 
 Medfield. '1 his treacherous Indian had, it is said, a slit thumb, which cir- 
 cumstance led to his conviction. He had been absent from Marlborough 
 several months, but after his 'return would give no account of hims.lf whith- 
 er he had been, or how he had employed himself in the mean time. At 
 length, however, an inhabitant of Medfield, one whom Muunanaw had wound- 
 ed, being ai Marlborough, immediately recognized him by the mark on his 
 thumb, and charged him with his treachery. At first he denied the charge ; 
 but, finding that the proof against him could not be evaded, heat length own- 
 ed that he had been led away by Philip, and had assisted in the burning of 
 Medfield. 
 
 He was, however, suffered to'ive without molestation. His wigwam stood 
 on the borders of the beautiful lake, near the public house kept by Mr. Silas 
 Gates, where he lived with his family many years, till the infirmities of old 
 age came upon him. He was accustomed to repair to the neighboring or- 
 chards for the purpose of obtaining fruit. There was one tree of the fruit 
 of which he was particularly fond, and which was accordingly his favorite 
 plpce of resort. In this spot the old warrior expired. Old David Munnanaw 
 died a little more than 80 years since, having lived, as was supposed, nearly 
 or quite a century of years. Capt. Timothy Brigham, now iu his 9lst y-ar, 
 well recoilects having seen him, when he was a child of about 9 or IU years 
 old, at his grandfather's, Jonathan Brigham's, of Marlborough. According to 
 this account, Munnanaw must have been a young man, 25 or 30 years of age, 
 at the time of Philip's war. Capt. B. represents him as bearing the marks 
 of extreme old age, his flesh wasted, and his skin shrivelled. He understood 
 that he had the reputation of having been treacherous to the English. Abim- 
 ilech David, supposed to be a sou of the former, was a tall, stout, well pro- 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 23 
 
 Plantation of Marlborough, was completely broken up and soon 
 passed into other hands. On the 15th of July 1684, a few weeks 
 subsequent to the date of the Indian deed of the English Plantation, 
 the Indian lands were formally transferred by deed to John Brig- 
 ham of Marlborough and his fellow purchasers ;* and in October, 
 1636, the aforesaid John Brigham who was a noted surveyor and 
 speculator in lands, was appointed " to lay out 30 acres to each of 
 the proprietors in some of the best of the land lying as convenient 
 as mav be to the town of Marlborough." 
 
 June the 5th 1700, the inhabitants of Marlborough petitioned 
 the General Court, that the proprietors of the Indian lands might 
 be annexed to the said town, which petition was granted, and Marl- 
 borough accordingly received an accession of 6000 acres, a large 
 proportion of which is good land. 
 
 After the close of Philip's war the inhabitants of Marlborough 
 do not appear to have been seriously molested by the Indians till 
 after the commencement of the eighteenth century. 
 
 In the mean time the settlement had extended itself towards the 
 borders of the town, so that some time previous to the close of the 
 
 portioned Indian, is well remembered by many persons now living. Abimi- 
 lech had several daughters, among whom were, Sue, Deborah, Esther, Pa- 
 tience, Nabhy, and Betty. They lived in a wretched hovel or wigwam, un- 
 der the large oak now standing, near the dwelling house ot Mr. Warrtn Brig- 
 ham. They had became dissolute in their habits, and were exceedingly 
 troublesome to their neighbors ; and they are remembered with very little 
 respect or affection. 
 
 The Indian burying ground, where the last remnants of the race were in- 
 terred, is situated a few rods from the south road, lea ling from Marlborough 
 to Northborough, near the residence of Widow Holyoke, in a field belonging 
 to the old Brigham farm. It has bten enjoined on the family in each suc- 
 ceeding generation, not to trespass on this repository of the dead ; an injunc- 
 tion which has hiiherto been duly regarded. The burying ground is about 
 five rods in length, and somewhat more than one rod in hrtadth, covered with 
 wild grass and loose stones. A few years since, as 1 have been informed, as 
 many as twenty ©r thirty graves were plainly distinguishable, though the}' 
 have now almost wholly disappeared. Two of the graves were situated with- 
 out the bounds of the rest, and in a direction perpendicular to them ; the for- 
 mer being from north to south, the latter from east to west. Many aged per- 
 sons can remember when Die last degraded remnants of the race, once inhab- 
 iting the soil we occupy, euclosed in rude coffins of rough boards, hastily put 
 together, and without any religious ceremony, were convejed to this reposi- 
 tory of the dead. 
 
 * This deed appears to have been obtained by unfair means, as in the 
 following September, a committee appointed bv the General Court to exam- 
 ine into the grounds of complaint made by the Indians against the English of 
 Marlborough, reported in favor of the Indians, and "the Court ordered and de- 
 clared that the Indian deed of sale to the inhabitant? of Marlborough of 5800 
 acres of land (the whole of the Indian Plantation with the exception ot the 
 Indian Planting fir 1 ') bearing date July 15, 1684, is illegal and consequently 
 null and void. 1 ' 
 
 / 
 
24 HISTORY OF NORTIIBOROUGH. 
 
 seventeenth century, some of the lands now included within the 
 limits of Westborough and Northborough, then called Chauncey, 
 or Chauncey Village, had been laid out for farms. 
 
 Indeed so early as 1660, the very year that Marlborough was 
 incorporated, several tracts of meadow, lying witlun the limits of 
 this town, were surveyed and the names given them which they 
 now bear.* And, in 1662, three large meadows, Cold Harbour 
 Meadow, Middle Meadow, and Chauncey Meadow, the first of which 
 and part of the second, lie within the limits of this town, were or- 
 dered to be surveyed, and each to be laid out in thirty four lots, 
 which was probably the number of proprietors at that time.t 
 
 The first grants of land lying within the limits of what is now 
 Westborough and Northborough, with the exception of the mead- 
 ows above named, bear the date of 1672. From this time, and be- 
 fore the close of the century, many of the proprietors of Marlbo- 
 rough had taken up their 2nd, 3d, and 4lh divisions in the wester- 
 ly part of the town, several of them west of the river Assabeth. 
 
 It is asserted by Rev. Mr. Whitney, in his history of this town, 
 that there were settlers in this part of Marlborough before there 
 were any in what is now Westborough. The first settler according 
 to tradition was John Brigham, from Sudbury, a noted land survey- 
 
 * Three Corner Meadow, Stirrup Meadow, Craue Meadow, Cedar Mead- 
 ow, &c. 
 
 t The origin of these names according to tradition was as follows : — Cold 
 Harbour Meadow, in the western part of this town, so called from the cir- 
 cumstance of a traveller, having lost his way, being compelled to remain 
 through a cold winter's night in a stack of hay in that place, and on the fol- 
 lowing morning, having made his way through the wilderness to the habita- 
 tions of man, and being asked where he lodged during the night, replied, " In 
 Cold Harbour." Middle Meadow, on ths borders of Westborough and North- 
 borough, so called probably from its situation in reference to the two others. 
 
 Chauncey Meadow, in Wes! borough, so called probably for the same 
 reason that the western part of Marlborough was called Chauncey. The ori- 
 gin of the name was known only by tradition in the Rev. Mr. Parkman's day, 
 who was ordained in Westborough, Oct. 23th, 17*24, and who gave the fol- 
 lowing account. " It is said that in early times one Mr. Chauncsy was lost 
 in one of the swamps here, and from hence this part of the town had its 
 name.'" I find from the records of the General Court for the year 1G65, that 
 Mr. Chauncey had taken up lands within the limits of Marlborough, and that 
 the proprietors of Marlborough were ordered to remunerate him for his expen- 
 ces incurred in laying out his farm, " and he hath liberty to lay out the same 
 in any land not formerly granted by this Court." Quere. — May not this have 
 been President Chauncey, of Harvard College, to whom, an account of the 
 smallness of his salary, repeated grants of land were made about this time by 
 the General Court? Dr. Chauncey, of Boston, the great-grandson of Pres- 
 ident Chauncey, says that the latter was the first, and the common ancestor 
 of all of that name in this place. If so, the Mr. C. above mentioned must have 
 been President Chauncey or one of his sons. 
 
HISTORY OF NOF.THEOROUGH. 25 
 
 or, undoubtedly the same person who has been mentioned in our ac- 
 count of the Indian Plantation. It appears from the Proprietors' 
 records that a grant of land was made to John Brigham, in 1672, 
 "in the place formerly desired, that i*, on Licor Meadow plain." 
 This land was probably part of the Coram Farm, so called, the 
 principal part of which lay on the northern side of the old Marlbo- 
 rough line,* and now constitutes, in whole, or in part, the farms of 
 Nahum Fay, Esq. John Green, Asa Fay, Lewis Fay, and Stephen 
 Williams, Esq. The lands of Mr. Brigham extended to the saw 
 mill of Mr. Lowell Holbrook, near which he erected a small cabin, 
 in which he lived several year?, remote from any human habitation, 
 till, at length, the fear of the Savages compelled him to retreat to a 
 place of greater security; and, it is said, that only a few days after 
 his removal, a party of Indians came to the place and burned his 
 house to the ground. 
 
 The first Saw Mill erected in this town was built by the above 
 named Brigham, and stood on the same spot, which is now occupied 
 for the same purpose.! 
 
 In the same year (1672) a grant of land was made to Samuel 
 Goodenow, grandfather of the late Asa Goodenow, and to Thomas 
 Brigham, the person mentioned in the last note, u by Double Pond 
 Meadow, on both sides said meadow."]; The lands taken up on the 
 account of the above named Samuel Goodenow, constituted three 
 
 *The old Marlborough line, was a straight line of seven miles in extent, 
 running through the northwest angle of this town, and cutting off more than 
 2000 acres, which constitute what is called the new grants, of which an ac- 
 count will be given hereafter. 
 
 t John Brigham was one of three brothers (John, Samuel, and Thomas) 
 who came from Sudbury to Marlborough sometime previous to 1672. Their 
 father was from England, married a Mercie Hurd also from England, settled 
 in Sudbury, where he died probably in middle life, as his widow had buried 
 a second husband by the name of Hunt, before her sons removed to Marlbo- 
 rough. Samuel Brigham, was the grand-father of the late Dr. Samuel Brig- 
 ham, of Marlborough : Thomas was an ancestor of the late Judge Brigham, of 
 Westborough ; and John, who was sometimes called Doctor Brigham, was the 
 father of the Mrs. Mary Fay, wife of Gershom Fay, of whose remarkable es- 
 cape from the Indians we shall presently give an account. John Brigham 
 was one of the selectmen of Marlborough in 1679, and in the winter of 1689 
 90, representative to the Convention then sitting in Boston. The Coram Farm, 
 was granted him, it is said, by the General Court to compensate him for ser- 
 vices as a surveyor of lauds. Mr. Brigham lived to be quite aged, and used 
 to come to reside with his daughter Mrs. Fay, in this town. 
 
 % Quere. May not this meadow be the one which lies between Great 
 and Little Chauncey ponds, which, as they are connected with each other 
 by a water communication, might have been called at first Double Pond ? 
 David Brigham, son of Thomas, lived on the borders of Great Chauncey, on 
 the farm now in the possession of Lovelt Peters, Esq. 
 
26 HISTORY OF NORTIIEOROUGH. 
 
 of the oldest settlements in this town, on one of which was'the prin- 
 cipal garrison house, used for many years as a defence against the 
 Indians, and which stood on the farm of Mr. Gill Bartlett, then own- 
 ed hy Samuel Goodenow, Jr. The other two, were in the vicinity 
 of this, and constitute in whole, or in part, the farms of Deac. Jonas 
 Bartlett and Mr. Stephen How. 
 
 In the same year, a grant of land was made to John Rfdiet, 
 "west of Assaheth River, northwest side of the Chauncey Great 
 Pond, bounded on the east hy a Spruce Swamp :" another tract on 
 "the Nepmuck road, that formerly led toward Coneticoat."* The 
 land of John Red:et, who was one of the first proprietors and great- 
 est land holders of Marlhorough, came into the possession of Na- 
 thaniel Oaks, who married his daughter, and who lived on the farm 
 owned in succession by Rev. John Martyn and Rev. Peter Whitney, 
 and now in the possession of Mr. Jacob Pierce. t Capt. James Ea- 
 ger was another of the first settlers of this town. He lived near the 
 centre of the town on the farm now in the possession of Mr. John 
 Fisk. His house was once used for a garrison, and was for many 
 years occupied as a tavern, being the first that was opened in the 
 place.! 
 
 * ''■The Nepmuck Road, that formerly led toward Coneticoat, 11 was the 
 old Connecticut road that passed through the southeast part of this town, 
 over Rock Hill, east of Great and Little Chauncey ponds, into Westborough 
 and thence through Hassanamesit or Grafton. 1. Hist. Col. 1. p. 185 and 
 192. 
 
 t Nathaniel Oaks came from England, married Mehitabel, daughter of 
 John Ilediet, v.'ho died Nov. 25th, 1702, without children. His second wife 
 Mary, was a daughter of Adam Holloway, by whom he had the following 
 children, viz. — Nathaniel, who lived at Bolton. William, burned to death at 
 Shrewsbury in the house of Capt. Keyes. Hannah, married to Gersham Fay, 
 Jr. died March 8, 1806, wanting but a few months of a century. She was 
 the mother of the late Thaddeus P'ay, who r1i<d. July 22, 1822, aged 91 years. 
 Mary, married to Daniel Maynard, Marlborough. Ann, married to David 
 Maynard, Westboiough. John, built the house near Col. Crawford's, owned 
 by Joel Gasset. Jonathan, removed to Harvard. George, lived near the 
 house of Mr. Luther Hawse, and built a saw mill on the river Assabeth. 
 
 J Capt. James Eager was a native of Marlborough, born in 1685, died 
 1755, a^ed 70. He was one of the leading men of the place at the time that 
 Northhorou^h became a separate precinct. It is said that his house was the 
 first that was built on the new Connecticut road, between the house of Samu- 
 el Goodenow and the town of Worcester. It is but little more than a hund- 
 red years, since there was not a human habitation on the road from Marlbo- 
 rough to Brookfield, west of the Goodenow farm, in the eastern part of this 
 town, with the exception of a few log houses in that part of Worcester called 
 Boggachoag. James Eager, Jr. a son of the above, was married to Mariam, 
 daughter of Joseph Wheeler. Tht ir daughter Zilpeh, was married to Mich- 
 ael, son of Rev. John Martyn through whom there are several persons in this 
 town who trace their desceut from the first minister of the place. 
 
HISTORY Otf NORTHBOROUGH. 27 
 
 Several other persons settled in what is now Marlborough, in 
 the early part of the last century.* 
 
 Soon alter the commencement of the eighteenth century, the 
 English settlers of Marlborough were again exposed to the horrors 
 of Indian warfare. It will be difficult for us, who are permitted to 
 dwell in security under the shelter of the domestic roof, to form 
 an adequate idea of the perilous condition of our forefathers, at 
 this gloomy period. " We have, indeed, heard within our ears, 
 and our fathers have told'" us the story of their dangers and suffer- 
 ings " in the waste and howling wilderness." But how difficult to 
 enter into the feelings of men, who were in constant peril for their 
 lives ; who, like the children of Israel in rebuilding the walls of 
 Jerusalem, repaired to their work with weapons in their hands, 
 and who were liable to be waked from their midnight slumbers by 
 the savage yells of a pitiless foe? In many instances were they 
 
 *Simeon Howard was the father of Cornet Simeon Howard, and of Jona- 
 than Howard, whose son, Gideon Howard, removed to Worthington, in this 
 state, where his descendants, it is supposed, still live. 
 
 Simon Howard, Senior, from Concord, was another of the first settlers. 
 His house stood near the hearse house, on the land of Mr. Asa Fay. 
 
 It is not known whether the Simeon Howard mentioned above, was re- 
 lated to Simeon Howard, D. D. late pastor of the west church in Boston. 
 
 Adam Holloway, from Concord, (died in 1733, aged 80,) and his son 
 Lieut. Wm. Holloway, (died Jan. 6, 17G0, aged 71,) settled on the farm now 
 owned by Stephen Williams, Esq. 
 
 Lieut. Wm. Ho.loway, married Mary, (died March 9, 1788, aged 94,) a 
 daughter of Simeon Howard, Senior, by whom he had two sons and four 
 daughters. The sons died youns;. Of the daughters, Mary, married Jonathan 
 Bartlrtt, died Dec. 22, 1821, aged 95. — Hannah, married Capt. James Stone, 
 of Western. — Betty, married* Daniel W heeler, of Hardwick. — Jemima, mar- 
 ried John Taylor, who died at St. Albans, Vt. 
 
 John Taylor, was the father of Col. Holloway Taylor now of St. Albans 
 and of John Taylor, Esq an Attorney at law, at Northampton. 
 
 Gershom Fay, Senior, was one of the first settlers of this town. He was 
 the son of John Fay, of Marlborough, married Mary, a daughter of John 
 Brigham, died in 1720. He lived at first in the easterly part of the town, af- 
 terwards, built a house on the Coram Farm, near the bend of the road, between 
 the dwelling house of Capt. Hastings, and that of Stephen Williams, Esq. 
 His children were Gershom, Mary, Susanna, Sarah, Silas, Timothy, and Paul, 
 
 Thomas Ward, from Marlborough, was the first settler on the farm now 
 in the possession of Aaapb Rice ; and Deac. Isaac Tomblin on the farm of the 
 late Deac. Isaac Davis. 
 
 Hezekiah Tomblin, lived first on Tomblin Hill, so called; Ephraim Bee- 
 man, on the farm ot Samuel Dalrymple. 
 
 Joseph Wheeler, (died iu 1747, aged 56,) lived on the southern declivity 
 of Ball's Hill, so called. 
 
 Ephraim Allen, from Hoxbury, purchased of an Eleazer How, a few acres 
 of land, with a grist mill erected thereon, the site of the present mill, and 
 Cotton Factory. This was the first, and for many years the only grist mill, 
 in this town. 
 
28 
 
 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 compelled to desert their farms, leaving their lands untilled, while 
 old and young, the strong and the feeble, flocked to the frail forti- 
 fications, denominated garrisons, as their only means of safety. 
 
 These were usually nothing more than common dwelling hous- 
 es', surrounded by palisades, aud furnished with a supply of fire 
 arms and ammunition. In the year 171 1, there were no fewer 
 than twenty six garrison houses within the limits of Marlborough, 
 to each of which were assigned, on an average, five or six fami- 
 lies, the whole number of families being one hundred and thirty 
 seven.* 
 
 *" Marlborough, December 11, 1711. 
 
 " These several persons are allowed by the Captain Generall. 
 
 " The persons assigned to each particular Garrison are as followeth : 
 Ordered, by us the Subscribers, by the direction of an act of the Generall 
 Court, entitled an act for the better security and defence of the fronteers. 
 
 Capt. How's Garison. 
 Samuel Stevens 
 James How 
 Jonathan How 
 Samuel Stow, Senior 
 Thomas Stow 
 Jonathan Morse. 
 
 Mr. Breck's* Garison. 
 
 Capt. Kerly's Garison. 
 Nathaniel Joslin 
 Joseph Maynard 
 Deacon Woods 
 Nathaniel Johnson 
 Thomas Amsden 
 Simon Gates 
 Joseph Johnson. 
 
 Capt. Brigham's Gaeison. 
 Peter Plimpton 
 Benjamin Mixer 
 
 Isaac Amsden's Garison. 
 Thomas Newton 
 Sergeant Mainard 
 James Woods 
 Adam Martin 
 Is. Tempels 
 Deacon Newton 
 John Amsden. 
 
 Is. How's Garison. 
 Moses Newton 
 David Fay 
 John N- wton 
 Widdow Johnson 
 Moses Newton, Jr. 
 James Kady. 
 
 * This undoubtedly was the Rev. Robert 
 Marlborough. 
 
 Lieut. Williams' Garison. 
 Thomas Beman 
 Peter Bent 
 Richard Barns 
 Edward Barns 
 
 Ensign How's Garison. 
 Ensign Bouker 
 Joseph Wait 
 David Church 
 Benjamin Rice 
 Peter Rice 
 Jacob Rice 
 Joseph Rice. 
 
 Samuel Morril's Garison. 
 Sergeant Barret 
 John Barns 
 Benjamin Baylis 
 Joseph Ward 
 Joshua Rice 
 Thomas Martin 
 Samuel Bush. 
 
 Thomas Brigham's Garison. 
 Jonathan Brigham 
 Oliver Ward 
 Increas Ward. 
 
 John How's Garison. 
 Zac. Eag>r 
 Abraham Fager 
 Daniel Johnson 
 Samuel Wheelock 
 Obadiah Ward 
 Thomas Axtel. 
 
 Samuel Goodenow's Garison. 
 Nathaniel Oakes 
 
 Breck, the second Minister 
 
 of 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 29 
 
 For several of the preceding years, the inhabitants, especially 
 such as lived in the borders of the town, had been kept ;n a state 
 of constant anxiety and alarm, in consequence of the hostile atti- 
 tude of the Indians. 
 
 August 8th, 1704, a party of Indians, eight or ten in num- 
 ber, rushed suddenly from the woods, and fell upon a number 
 
 Jonathan Farbush 
 Gershom Fay. 
 
 Lieut. How's Garison. 
 Thomas Ward 
 Edward Rice 
 
 Nathan Brigham's Garison. 
 Joseph Stratten 
 Henry Bartlett 
 Ellicksander Steward. 
 
 Samuel Ward Senior's Garison. 
 William Ward 
 Widdow Hannah Ward 
 Jonathan Johnson, Senior 
 Caleb Rice. 
 
 John Mathew's Garison. 
 William Johnson 
 Samuel Ward. 
 
 Daniel Rice's Garison. 
 Widdow Sarah Tayler 
 Suply Weeks 
 Elyazer Taylyer. 
 
 Samuel Forbush's Garison. 
 James Bradish 
 Thomas Forbush 
 James Glesson. 
 
 Edmond Rice's Garison. 
 David Brigham 
 Isaac Tomblin 
 David Maynard. 
 
 Thomas Rice's Garison. 
 John Pratt 
 Charles Rice. 
 
 Thomas Hapgood's Garison. 
 John Farbush 
 
 John Wheeler 
 Josiah How 
 
 B Curly (Kerly) Senior 
 
 Jam«s Curly. 
 
 Simon Mainard's Garison. 
 
 Adam Holloway 
 Benjamin Whitney 
 Joseph Newton 
 John Keyes 
 Abrell Bush. 
 
 Mill Garison. 
 Thomas Barret 
 John Banister. 
 
 John Newton Jr's Garison. 
 Eliazer Bellows 
 John Bellows 
 James Eager 
 James Newton 
 Benjamin Newtoa 
 Ephraim Newton 
 John Woods 
 Abraham Newton. 
 
 Jonathan Newton's Garison. 
 Is. Woods 
 Thomas Witherby 
 Is. Amsden 
 Moses Lenard 
 Roger Bruce. 
 
 Joseph Morse's Garis«n. 
 Thomas Biglo 
 Samuel Biglo 
 Samuel Mors 
 John Biglo 
 
 John Sherman 
 Daniel Harington 
 
 THOMAS HOW 
 
 SAMUEL BRIGHAM 
 
 ISAAC AMSDEN 
 
 ELEAZER HOW 
 
 DANIEL HOW 
 
 JOHN BOUKER 
 
 JONATHAN JOHNSON 
 
 NATHANIEL JOSLIN 
 
 PETER RICE 
 
 JOHN MA1NARD 
 
 JOHN BARRETT 
 
 A 
 d 
 
 I] 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 ■ 
 • Committee," 
 
SO HISTORY OF KORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 of the inhabitants of what is now Westborough, while at work in 
 the field ; killed Nahor, a son oi Mr. Edmund Rice, on the spot, 
 seized and carried into captivity two other sons, Silas and Timo- 
 thy ; also Ashur and Adonijah, two sons of Mr. Thomas Rice. 
 Ashur was redeemed by his father, and returned in about four years. 
 He afterwards settled in Spencer. Adonijah remained in Canada, 
 cultivated a farm in the vicinity of Montreal. His Indian name was 
 Asaunaugooton. The other two lived among the Indians, married 
 Indian wives, acquired their habits, and lost all knowledge of the 
 English language. The puritanical names of Silas and Timothy 
 were changed into the heathenish, but not unmusical ones of Too- 
 kanowras and Oughtsorongoughton. The latter is said to have 
 been the third of the six chiefs of the Cagnawaga tribe, and the 
 one who made the speech to Gen. Gage, in behalf of his tribe, 
 soon after the reduction of Montreal. This chief, in the year 1740, 
 thirty six years after his captivity, visited his relations in Westbo- 
 rough, and retained, it is said, a distinct recollection of the circum- 
 stances of his captivity, and of several aged persons then living. 
 Mr. Seth Rice, father of the late Deac. Seth Rice, and who died in 
 1796, aged 91, was a brother, and Thankful, wife of the late Mr. 
 Josiah Rice, was a sister, of the above named Silas and Timothy. 
 
 In the preceding month, (July) two of the inhabitants of Marl- 
 borough, viz. Abraham How and Benjamin Hutchins, were slain by 
 the Indians at Lancaster. 
 
 On the 15th of October, 1705, Mr. John Biglow, of Marlborough, 
 being then at Lancaster, at the garrison house of Mr. Thomas Saw- 
 yer, was, with Mr. Sawyer and his son Elias, taken by the Indians, 
 and conveyed to Canada. They obtained their release in the fol- 
 lowing manner: Both of them were ingenious mechanics, one, 
 (Sawyer) a blacksmith, the other, (Biglow) a carpenter. While 
 they were at Montreal, thpy proposed to the French Governor, who 
 resided in that city, that, in case he would procure their ransom, 
 they would erect for him a saw mill, there being none at that time 
 in all Canada. The offer was readily accepted ; they fulfilled their 
 engagement, and, after some delays, were permitted to return to 
 their friends, with whom they lived to a good old age. Mr. Big- 
 low, in token of his gratitude for his remarkable deliverance from 
 captivity, called his daughter, born soon after his return, " Free- 
 dom ;" and a second, born some time afterwards, he called " Com- 
 fort," as expressive of the happiness and peace he then enjoyed, 
 contrasted with the hardships and fears of a state of captivity. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTITEOROUGir. 3 1 
 
 Comfort was married to Joseph Briffham, the father of Mr. Jonah 
 Brigham, of this (own, who, when a child, often listened to the »c- 
 count given by his grandfather Biglow, of the circumstances of his 
 captivity and escape. 
 
 In 1707, August 18th, the following tragical event occurred in 
 what is now the easterly part of N'orthhorough. There was at 
 this time a garrison house standing on the south side of the road, 
 near the brook, known by the name of Stirrup Erook, which cros- 
 ses the great road between the farms of Messrs. Jonas and Gill 
 Bartlett, then in the possession of Samuel Goodenow. As Mary 
 Goodenow, daughter of Samuel, and Mrs. Mary Fay, wife of Ger- 
 shom Fay, were gathering herbs in the adjoining meadow, a parly 
 of Indians, twenty four in number, all of whom are said to have 
 been stout warriors, were seen issuing from the woods and making 
 towards them. Mrs. Fay succeeded in effecting her escape. She 
 was closely pursued by a party of the enemy ; but before they 
 came up, had time to enter the garrison, and to fasten the gate of 
 the enclosure. There fortunately happened to be one man then 
 within, the rest of the men belonging to the garrison being in the 
 fields at work. Their savage invaders attempted in vain to break 
 through the enclosure. These heroic defenders, by dint of great 
 exertion, maintained the unequal conflict, till a party of friends, 
 alarmed by the report of the muskets, came to their relief, when 
 the enemy betook themselves to flight.* 
 
 The other unfortunate young woman, Miss Goodenow, being re- 
 tarded in her flight by lameness, was seized by her merciless pur- 
 suers, dragged across the brook to the side of the hill, a little south 
 of the road, where she was killed and scalped, and where her man- 
 gled body was afterwards found and buried, and where her grave 
 is shown at this day. 
 
 On the following day, the enemy were pursued by a company 
 of about thirty men, from Marlborough and Lancaster, and over- 
 
 * Mrs. Fay, it is said, discovered great presence of mind during this as- 
 sault, being constantly employed in loading and reloading the muskets be- 
 longing to the garrison, anci handing them to her companion, who by this 
 means was able to keep up a constant fire upon the invaders. No wonder 
 that she was brave, for she had much at stake. She was then the mother of 
 two young children, one four, and the other two years old. Gershcm, fath- 
 er of the late Thaddeus Fay, and Mary, afterwards married to George Sipitb* 
 Her third, called Susanna, who was born on the l&thof the following Novem- 
 ber, was subject to a constant nervous trembling, caused, it is supposed, by 
 the mother's fright, received at this time. At her father's death, Nov. 24, 
 1720, she was left to the care of her brother, the late Timothy Fay, with 
 whom she lived till her decease. 
 
32 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 taken in what is now Sterling, where a hard conflict ensued, in 
 which nine of their number, and two of our men were slain. In 
 one of their packs was found the scalp of the unfortunate Miss 
 Goodenow, which was the first intimation that was obtained of her 
 melancholy fate. 
 
 Nothing worthy of record is preserved of what took place be- 
 tween this period* and the incorporation of the westerly part of 
 Marlborough, then called Chauncey Village, and including what is 
 now Westborough and Northborough. The act of incorporation is 
 dated November 19, 1717, O. S. or, in our present reckoning, No- 
 vember 30. 
 
 In the fall of 1718, the first meeting house was raised, which 
 stood near the northern limits of Westborough, not far from the 
 public house kept by Mr. Silas Wesson. It was not, however, till 
 October 28, 1724, or nearly seven years after the town was incor- 
 porated, that a church was gathered, and the Rev. Mr. Parkman, 
 the first minister of Westborough, was ordained. 
 
 It was at this house that our fathers, the first settlers of North- 
 borough, worshipped for more than twenty years, some of them 
 being accustomed to walk every Sabbath the distance of five or 
 six miles. 
 
 At length, October 20, 1744, the town of Westborough, consist- 
 ing at that time of one hundred and twenty five families, was di- 
 vided into two precincts ; the north part, to use the words of Rev. 
 Mr. Parkman, "being indeed very small. "t The number of families 
 set off" to the north precinct was only thirty eight ; while eighty 
 seven families remained attached to the old society. Nor was the 
 separation effected without much opposition, and mutual recrimina- 
 tion, the unhappy effects of which lasted many years. 
 
 Having arrived at that period of our history, when Northbo- 
 rough became a separate precinct, we proceed to give some ac- 
 count of its boundaries, dimensions, face of the soil, Sic. 
 
 * I find, from a record kept by Col. Williams, of Marlborough, that Jon- 
 athan Johnson was slain by the Indians, October 12, 1708, but at what place, 
 and under what circumstances, I have not been able to ascertain. 
 
 t The act of the General Court, setting off the north part of Westbo- 
 rouo'h as a separate precinct, provides, ' k that the Inhabitants of said north 
 part should give security to Rev. Mr. Parkman, their present pastor, to give 
 him £100, lawful money, settlement, and £50, like money, per annum, in 
 case he should incline to settle with them, agreeably to what they now prom- 
 ise ; or otherwise, £12, 10*. like money, if he chooses to continue in the south 
 part." It is unnecessary to add, that Rev. Mr. Parkman chose to remain 
 the minister of the old parish. He died Dec. 9, 1782, in the 80th year of hi* 
 age, and the 59th of his ministry. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 33 
 
 Boundaries, fee. — A plan of the town was made in 1795, by Mr. 
 Silas Keyes, surveyor, then an inhabitant of the place. According 
 to this plan, Northborough contained 10096 acres, including ponds 
 and roads. Since that date, that is, Feb. 15, 1806, the dividing 
 line between this town and Berlin, was by mutual consent, altered 
 so as to bring both towns into a better shape ; and in June 20, 1 807, 
 the line between Northborough and Marlborough was altered, so 
 as to include the farm of Deac. Jonas Bartlett, within the limits of 
 this town. In its present state, the town contains about 10,150 
 acres. 
 
 The boundaries according to the plan made in 1795, are as fol- 
 lows* : — Beginning at the southwest corner, at a heap of stones on 
 Shrewsbury line, it thence runs east, nineteen degrees north, four 
 hundred and eighty nine rods, to a stake by the river Assabeth ; 
 thence, in a northeasterly direction, as the river runs, one hundred 
 and seventy six rods, to the County road, near the dwelling house 
 of Phineas Davis, Esq. ; thence, by said river, one hundred and 
 ninety four rods, to a stake and stones ; thence east, twenty degrees 
 north, eight hundred and sixty four rods, to a stake and stones on 
 Southborough line. (The above are the boundaries between 
 Northborough and Westborough.) From the last mentioned bounds, 
 the line runs north, thirty two degrees west, one hundred and forty 
 rods by Southborough, to a stake and stones at the corner of Marl- 
 borough. (The above are the boundaries between Northborough 
 and Southborough.) From Marlborough corner the line ran, ac- 
 cording to the plan of Mr. Keyes, north, thirty degrees forty five 
 minutes west, one hundred and eighty seven rod*, to a stake and 
 stones; thence north, forty degrees thirty minutes west, one hun- 
 dred and ten rods, to do. ; thence north, twenty two degrees thirty 
 minutes west, one hundred and forty eight rods, to do. ; thence 
 north, thirty two degrees west, forty rods, to a swamp white oak; 
 thence north, twenty nine degrees west, seventy two rods, to a 
 stake and stones; thence north, thirty degrees west, sixty four rods, 
 to do. by the County road ; thence north, thirty one degrees forty 
 minutes west, seventy seven rods, to do. ; thence north, twenty 
 eight degrees fifteen minutes west, one hundred and twenty eight 
 rods, to a walnut tree by the river; thence north, thirty three de- 
 grees thirty minutes west, sixty eight rods, to a large oak tree 
 marked; thence north, twenty seven degrees west, forty seven 
 
 * For the alterations referred to above, see Massachusetts Special Laws,, 
 Tol. IV. p. 3 and 112. 
 
34 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 rods, to a pine tree marked ; thence north, thirty one degrees thir- 
 ty minutes west, one hundred and twenty nine rods, to a stake and 
 stones by Berlin line or corner. (The above were the former 
 bounds between Northborough and Marlborough ; for the alteration 
 see note.) From Berlin corner, the line ran north, thirty degrees 
 west, one hundred and forty eight rods, to a heap of stones ; thence 
 east, thirty two degrees north, ninety rods, to the Long Stone, so 
 called ; thence west, sixteen degrees north, eight hundred and ten 
 rods, to a heap of stones on Boylston line. (These were the for- 
 mer bounds between Northborough and Berlin ; for the alteration 
 see note.) Thence south, sixteen degrees west, eight hundred 
 and sixty eight rods, to a heap of stones at Shrewsbury corner. 
 (This is the line between Northborough and Boylston.) Thence 
 south, sixteen degrees west, one hundred and forty nine rods, to a 
 heap of stones. (This is supposed to be on or near the old Marl- 
 borough line, which extended thence in one direction to the north- 
 west corner of Marlborough.) Thence south, twenty four degrees 
 east, one hundred and eighty two rods, to a great oak ; thence 
 south, twenty one degrees east, one hundred and fifty rods, to a 
 heap of stones ; thence south, one degree east, twenty rods to the 
 County road ; thence, in the same direction, three hundred and 
 seventeen rods, to a red oak ; thence south, twenty eight degrees 
 thirty five minutes east, one hundred and ninety four rods, to where 
 it began. (These are the bounds between Nortbborough and 
 Shrewsbury.) 
 
 Besides what was originally a part of Marlborough, this town 
 includes a large triangular tract, lying north of the old Marlborough 
 line, (of which the Coram Farm and the Brown Farm made apart) 
 and containing, as has been estimated, between two and three thou- 
 sand acres. This tract, with several others now in the westerly 
 part of Westborougb, was surveyed in January and February, 
 1715-16, by VYm. Ward, and annexed to Cbauncey Village by a 
 grant of the General Court, before the latter was separated from 
 Marlborough. 
 
 In March and April, 1721, this tract was asrain surveyed by 
 James Keyes; and a committee, consisting of John Sherman, Da- 
 vid Brigham, and Joseph Wheeler, was appointed to lay it out in 
 forty five shares, according to the number of the proprietors, which 
 shares were afterwards divided among them by lot. 
 
 Besides the above tract, the principal part of the farm of Deac. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 35 
 
 Caleb Rice, of Marlborough,* which lay without the original boun- 
 daries of the town, with another tract nearly as large, adjoining the 
 former, falls within the limits of Northborough, forming the south- 
 west angle of the town. 
 
 Northborough is of an irregular form, its average length being 
 about five miles, and its average breadth somewhat more than 
 three miles. 
 
 Surface, Soil, &c. — The principal part of the town consists of 
 a valley, environed by the hills of Marlborough on the east, Berlin 
 on the north, and Boylston and Shrewsbury on the west, and open- 
 ing into Westborough on the south, which town is an extension of 
 the same low grounds. The surface of this valley is, however, di- 
 versified by numerous hills, some of which are so considerable as 
 to be distinguished by r.ames. The northwest corner of the town, 
 comprehending five or six good farms, and more than 1000 acres of 
 land, forms part of the ridge of high land, running from Berlin, 
 through Boylston and Shrewsbury, and is commonly called Ball's 
 Hill.t 
 
 Liquor Hill is a beautiful eminence, rising with a gentle decliv- 
 ity from the great road, nearly opposite to the church, skirted with 
 forest trees, while its summit and its northern and southern declivi- 
 ties are open to the view and form a rich and pleasing prospect. 
 Edmund Hill, about a mile in the northerly direction from the 
 church, and Cedar Hill, in the southeastern part of the town, are 
 similar in form to L:o t uor Hill, but less open to observation. 
 
 Northborough is well supplied with streams of water. The 
 principal stream is the river Assabeth, which, rising in Grafton, and 
 crossing an angle of Westborough, Hows diagonally in a northeast- 
 ern direction, through this town, crossing the great road, about 
 half a mile east of the church, and furnishing several valuable wa- 
 ter privileges. 
 
 Cold Harbour Brook rises in Shrewsbury, crosses the southeast 
 corner of Boylston, and enters this town. Having received a small 
 
 * Dear. Caleb Rice was the father of the late Josiah Rice, of this town, 
 who. died 1792, aged 92, and who came into possession of the farm abovemen- 
 tioned, and wa3 one of the greatest landholders in the town. That farm 
 alone contained above five hundred acres, besides which, he owned several 
 hundred acres in other parts of the town. 
 
 t So called from two brothers, James and Nathan Ball, from Watertown, 
 who settled there about the year 1720, and where some of their descendants 
 still live. James, the father of the late Doct. Stephen Ball, and grandfather 
 of the present Doct. Stephen Ball, Sen. died 1756, aged 6.2. Nathan, father 
 of Nathan Ball, died 1768, aged 73. 
 
 VOL. II. 21 
 
.36 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 tributary stream from Rocky Pond, in Boylston, and supplying wa- 
 ter for a Grist and Saw Mill, it flows in a very circuitous route 
 through a tract of rich intervales and extensive meadows, crossing 
 the road at Cold Harbour bridge, a few rods south of the church, 
 and having received another small stream from the west, on which 
 a Saw Mill is erected, it falls into the Assabeth, a little below where 
 the latter crosses the great road. 
 
 In the easterly part of the town, a small stream, called Stirrup 
 Brook, issuing from Little Chauncey Pond, furnishes a supply of 
 water for a Saw Mill, and is bordered by a rich intervale and 
 meadows. 
 
 Another small stream, called Hop Brook, from the abundance 
 of wild hops which formerly grew on its banks, rises in Shrews- 
 bury, crosses the southwest angle of this town, furnishing water 
 for two Saw Mills and one Grist Mill, and falls into the Assabeth, 
 soon after that river enters the town. It appears, therefore, that 
 all the waters of Northborough fall into the Assabeth, which con- 
 veys them to the Merrimack between Chelmsford and Tewksburj'. 
 
 The two principal ponds in Northborough are the Little Chaun- 
 cey, in the southeastern part of the town, containing sixty five acres, 
 and Solomon's Pond, in the northeastern part, containing twenty six 
 acres. Little Chauncey takes its name from Great Chauncey, in 
 Wesl borough, with which it is connected by a small stream. It is 
 a beautiful sheet of water, well stored with fish, its borders in part 
 fringed with woods, while to the east, it opens towards cultivated 
 fields. Solomon's Pond, so named from Solomon, an Indian, who 
 was drowned in it, is not destitute of beauty, and is encompassed 
 by a tract of excellent land. 
 
 The soil is in general rich and productive, the poorest being, 
 as Whitney justly observes, that u which appears as we travel the 
 great road." In the northern part of the town, the land is rocky 
 and hard, though it produces good crops of hay and grain. In the 
 middle and southern parts the land is more level, and if not more 
 productive, is cultivated with much less labor and expense. 
 
 Roads, &c. — The principal road is the old Worcester Post road, 
 which passes through the middle of the town, about forty rods south 
 of the Meeting House. The distance to Boston from this town is 
 34 miles ; to Worcester 10 miles. Four Stages, furnishing a daily 
 Mail from the east and from the west, pass on this road every day, 
 Sundays excepted. 
 
 The old County road from Framingham to Worcester, also leads 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 37 
 
 through the south part of the town ; and the Worcester Turnpike 
 crosses the southwest angle, passing one house only in Northbo- 
 rough. The roads from Lancaster to this place, one of which pas- 
 ses the Meeting House in Berlin, and that from Boylston, are much 
 travelled. The distance to Lancaster is 10 miles; to Boylston 6; 
 to Westborough 4^ miles. 
 
 The highways are kept in repair by an annual tax of from $500 
 to $800. 
 
 Mills, Manufactories, kc. — Northborough contains at present 
 four Grist Mills, five Saw Mills, two Carding Machines, a manufac- 
 tory for Hoes and Scythes ; large and commodious works recently 
 established by Capt. Thomas W. Lyon, for manufacturing Cotton 
 Machinery ; an extensive Tannery owned by Phinehas and Joseph 
 Davis, Esquires, whose annual sales of leather amount to $20,000. 
 There are also six Coopers, four Blacksmiths, one Saddle and Har- 
 ness Maker, one Book Binder, three Wheelwrights, eight or ten 
 Shoemakers, who, besides supplying the wants of the town, manu- 
 facture about 4000 pairs of shoes annually for a foreign market. 
 The Cotton Factory, built in 1814, by the Northborough Manufac- 
 turing Company, at an expense of about $30,000, was lately sold at 
 auction, and is now in the possession of Rogerson & Co. of Boston, 
 and Isaac Davis, Esq. and Mr. Asaph Rice, of this town. It stands 
 on the river Assabeth, which furnishes a sufficient supply of water 
 during the principal part of the season ; and contains over 700 spin- 
 dles for Cotton, and 100 for Woollen, 10 looms, a fulling mill, card- 
 ing machine, &c. and manufactures 80,000 yards of cloth annually. 
 
 There are in the town, two stores, furnished with a good as- 
 sortment of English and West India Goods, the one kept by Gale 
 & Davis ; the other by Rice, Farnsworth, & Co. 
 
 Population, Deaths, &c. — At the time of the ordination of Rev. 
 Mr. Martyn, (1746) there were 40 families in the place ; the num- 
 ber had increased to 82 families at the ordination of Rev. Mr. Whit- 
 ney, (1767); and, in 1796, to more than 110 families. By the cen- 
 sus of 1810, the number of inhabitants was 794; by that of 1820, 
 1018, making an increase of 224 in ten years. By a census taken 
 the last winter, however, and which it is believed is very nearly 
 accurate, the whole number of inhabitants was only 946, of whom 
 488 were males, and 458 females. 
 
 In the autumn of 1746, the year that Rev. Mr. Martyn was or- 
 dained, and for several following years, particularly in 1749 and 
 1750, this society was visited by a very mortal sickness among 
 
38 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 children, by which the growth of the society must have been very 
 sensibly checked, and which must have been attended with circum- 
 stances of peculiar distress.* 
 
 Sixty children, out of a population which could not have much 
 exceeded three hundred, fell victims to the desolating pestilence ; 
 and, with the exception 01" one adult, (Benjamin Rugg, a stranger,) 
 were the first persons that were buried in the new church yard.t 
 
 This was the last sweeping, mortal sickness, with which this 
 place has been visited. 
 
 Since the great sicknesss, in the years 1749 and 1750, no town 
 in this vicinity has been more exempt from wasting, mortal distem- 
 pers. The number of deaths from 1780, to 1800, including a peri- 
 od of twenty years, amounted to only 146, averaging a little more 
 than 7 in a year. During the first twenty five years of the present 
 century, the number was 282. The average number for the last 
 ten years has been about ll£ annually, in a population of nearly a 
 thousand souls. The whole number of deaths from 1780, to the 
 present date, (June, 1826) is 450 ; of whom seventy eight were 70 
 years and upwards ; forty three, 80 years and upwards ; seventeen, 
 90 years and upwards; one (Wid. Hannah Fay J) in her hundredth 
 year; and one (Deac. Jonathan Livermore§) one hundred years 
 and seven months. There are now living in this town, five or six 
 
 *The sickness which prevailed in 1746, Capt. Timothy Brigham informs 
 me, was the dysentery, then called, " the fevf-r and flux. 1 ' Capt. B. then a 
 child of 10 years old, lost a sister, and was himself sick of the disease- He 
 thinks that as many as 30 children died that year, in this place. He recol- 
 lects being attended in his sickness by Doct. Benjamin Gott, of Marlborough. 
 The sickness of 1749 and 1750, was the " throat distemper^ 1 ' as it was termed, 
 which, for many years after its first appearance in New England, proved such 
 a desolating scourge. 
 
 tThe old burying ground, in which many of the first settlers of North- 
 borough were interred, is eayt of the road leading to YYestborough, a little 
 south of the dwelling house of Mr. William Maynard. It is now overgrown 
 with trees and brush. 
 
 $ Widow Haniiah Fay was a daughter of Nathaniel Oaks, was married 
 to G. rshom Fay, father of the late Thaddeus Fay, and died, March 8, 1806, 
 aged 100. 
 
 $ Deac. Livermore came from Watertown about A. D. 1720, and settled 
 on the Brown farm, so called, where Davil Dinsmore now lives. He was the 
 first Parish Clerk in this place, which office he held many years. He died 
 April 26, 1801, aged 101. A short time after he was 1U0 jears old, he rode 
 on horseback from his bouse to a military review, near the middle of the 
 town, the distance of three miles, and returned without fatigue. He posses- 
 sed uncommon learning for his time, was an accurate surveyor, and an excel- 
 lent penman, owmg to which circumstance, the early records of the town ap- 
 pear in a remarkably fine state. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGIT. 39 
 
 persons over eighty years ; and one, (Capt. Timothy Brigham,*) 
 in his ninety first year. One couple (Capt. Amos Ricet and his 
 wife) still survive, who were joined in marriage before the death 
 of Rev. Mr. Martyn, who baptised their first child. They were 
 married May 8th, H66, and have lived together more than sixty 
 years. 
 
 The average number of births for a year, has been, of late, about 
 thirty ; which, deducting the deaths, will give an annual increase of 
 from fifteen to twenty souls. 
 
 Civil History. — Nothing has been found on record relating to 
 the part which this town bore in the old French wars, as we have 
 been accustomed to hear them called by our aged fathers. We 
 learn, however, from the few who survive of the generation then 
 on the stage of active life, that this small district was not backward 
 in furnishing men to join the several expiditions, which were under- 
 taken for the conquest of the French in Canada. 
 
 Eliphalet Warren, John Carruth, and Adam Fay, joined the ex- 
 pedition to Halifax, in 1754. In the following year, Benjamin Flood 
 and Eber Eager, the latter of whom did not live to return, were at 
 Crown point. In 1758, the eight following persons were with the 
 army under General Abercromhie, at his defeat before Ticondero- 
 ga. Capt. Timothy Brigham, [now living and who retains a per- 
 fect recollection of the scenes he passed through in this ill-fated 
 expedition,] Eliphalet Stone, Samuel Stone, [who died on his re- 
 turn,] Benjamin Flood, Josiah Bowker, Samuel Morse, Gideon How- 
 ard, and Joel Rice. Capt. Brigham says that the attack upon the 
 French lines commenced at 5 o'clock, A. M. and lasted till 7 o'clock, 
 P. M. ; and that over 1900 of our men were missing at the calling 
 of the rolls that evening. Capt. B. says that after this repulse, the 
 army retreated to Lake George, soon after which, the company to 
 
 *Capt. Timothy Brigham is a son of Jesse, who was a son of Jonathan, 
 ■who was a son of Thomas Brigham, one of the early settlers of Marlborough, 
 He was present at the defeat oi the English, under Abercromhie, hefore Ti- 
 conderoga, in 1758, and Lieutenant of the company of minute >r,f-n that march- 
 ed down to Cambridge on the memorable 19th of April, 1775. Jonathan 
 Brigham was in the Indian fight, at Lancaster, (now Sterling) Aug. 19, HO?, 
 and stood next to Richard Singletary, who was killed in the action. This 
 fact, Capt. B. had from his own mouth. 
 
 t Capt. Amos Rice is a son of Jacob, who was a son of Jacob, who was 
 a son of Edward, one of the 13 original petitioners for the Plantation ol Marl- 
 borough. Benjamin, another son of Edward, was the father of Deac. Matthi- 
 as Rice, and of Simeon Rice, late of this town, and of Zerubbahe] Rice, 'ate 
 of Marlborough. Tradition says, that the first person by the name ot Rice, 
 who emigrated to New England, had eight sons, all of whem. lived to be 90 
 years old and upwards. 
 
40 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROCGH. 
 
 which he belonged (Capt. Stephen Maynard's of Westborough) was 
 dismissed and returned home. 
 
 There is one man, now living in this town, at the age of 88, 
 nearly, [Lieut. Abraham Munroe] who was at Halifax, in the regi- 
 ment of Maj. Rogers, of Londonderry, N. H. in the year 1757, 
 and, at the taking of Ticonderoga under Gen. Amherst, in 1759. 
 Mr. Munroe had there the rank of Ensign ; and, in the following 
 year, received a Lieutenancy. He served in the regiment of Col. 
 Saltonstal, of Haverhill; and, at the departure of our army for Mon- 
 treal, received orders to remain at the head of a detachment of 
 men, for the purpose of completing the repairs of the fortifications 
 at Crown Point. Lieut. Munroe continued at Ticonderoga, till his 
 discharge, in May, 1763, under Capt. Omsbury, or Amsbury, to 
 whom the command of the fort had been committed. 
 
 Several other persons belonging to this town, whose names I 
 have not learned, were in service at different times during the 
 French wars, some of whom did not live to return. 
 
 The following particulars have been collected relating to the 
 part which this town bore in the burdens and privations of the 
 revolutionary war. 
 
 It appears from the town records, that the inhabitants of this 
 town, took an early and decided stand in defence of the liberties of 
 our country. So early as March, 22d, 1773, more than two years 
 before hostilities commenced, a number of spirited resolutions were 
 passed at a district meeting, called for the purpose, among which 
 were the following : 
 
 " 2. Voted, as the opinion of this district, that it is the indispen- 
 sable duty of all men and all bodies of men to unite and strenuously 
 to oppose by all lawful ways and means, such unjust and unright- 
 eous encroachments, made or attempted to be made upon their just 
 right?; and that it is our duty earnestly to endeavor to hand those 
 rights down inviolate to our posterity, as they were handed to us 
 by our worthy ancestors. 
 
 " 3. Voted, that the thanks of this district be given to the town 
 of Boston tor their friendly, seasonable and necessary intelligence ; 
 and that they be desired to keep their watch, and guard against all 
 such invaders and incroaches for the future. 
 
 "4. Voted, that Capt. Bez. Eager, Doct. Stephen Ball, and Mr. 
 Timothy Fay, be a committee to make answer to the committee of 
 corres., at Boston, informing them of the opinion of this district in 
 this matter." 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 41 
 
 In August of the following year, eight months before the war 
 commenced, at a special meeting called for the purpose, the district 
 passed the following vote. — u That we are determined to defend 
 our charter rights and privileges, at the risk of our lives and for- 
 tunes, and that the town desire the committee of correspondence,* 
 to write to their brethren in Boston, and inform them thereof." 
 
 In November, 1774, the district voted to appropriate money in 
 the treasury to buy one hundred pounds of powder ; three hundred 
 pounds of lead, and two hundred and forty flints ; and on June 3d, 
 177G, it was resolved, "that it was the mind of this town to be inde- 
 pendent of Great Britain, in case the Continental Congress think 
 proper ; and that we are ready with our lives and fortunes, if in 
 Providence called, to defend the same." 
 
 Some time before the war broke out, a company of fifty minute 
 men was raised in this town, under the command of the late Capt. 
 Samuel Wood, who held themselves in readiness to march at a mo- 
 ment's warning, whenever and wherever hostilities should com- 
 mence.! At length the memorable 19th of April arrived, on which 
 day, the first blood in our Revolutionary struggle was shed, at Lex- 
 ington and Concord. On the same day, before one o'clock, P. M. 
 the tidings reached this place. The company of minute men be- 
 longing to this town was collecting at the time to listen to an oc- 
 casional patriotic discourse from Rev. Mr. Whitney. They were 
 directed without a moment's dela3', to put themselves in readiness 
 to march ; and in three or four hours from the time when the news 
 arrived, they had taken leave of their families and were paraded 
 in the yard of Capt. Woods' house, whence (the Rev. Mr. Whitney 
 having in a fervent prayer commended them to the protection of 
 the God of armies,) they immediately set out on their march for 
 the field of danger and of blood. { 
 
 *The following persons were a standing committee of Correspondence, in 
 1774. Bezaleel Eager, Seth Rice, Jr. Levi Brigham, Gillam Bass, and John 
 Ball. In the following year, the ever memorable 1775, there were seven on 
 the committee of correspondence, viz. Thadeus Fay, John Ball, Joel Rice, 
 Amos Rice, [now living] Arteinas Brigham, Jethro Peters, and Nathan Green. 
 
 f April 10th, 1775, the town voted to pay fifty minute men one shilling 
 each, for each half'day they shall meet to learn the Military art, for sixteen 
 half days ; and granted £40 for that purpose. The town also voted that Mr. 
 Timothy Brigham, Constable, pay to Henry Gardner, Esq. the Province tax, 
 which he has now in his hands, for the year 1773, and the District will in- 
 demnify him. Also Voted, to indemnify the Assessors for not making the 
 province tax for the year 1774. 
 
 % Of the fifty men belonging to this company, the following persons are 
 aow living in this town. Capt. Timothy Brigham, then the Lieut, of the 
 
 
42 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 Nor did the spirited resolutions, above adverted to, end in idle 
 words. They were the result of reflection and patriotic principle ; 
 and they led to the cheerful endurance of privations and hardships, 
 of which the descendants can probably form no adequate concep- 
 tion. 
 
 At one time five, and soon after three, at another five, at anoth- 
 er seven, and on one occasion seventeen men, were called for from 
 this small town by the General Court, and were marched in some 
 instances, several hundred miles, to mingle in the scenes of war.* 
 
 In the spring of 1781, agreeably to a resolve of the General 
 Court, this town was divided into eight classes, each class being re- 
 quired to furnish a man to serve in the Continental Arm} r for the 
 term of three years, or during the war. And what is worthy of re- 
 mark, as it is an evidence of the patriotic spirit which prevailed 
 among this people in the preceeiling autumn, viz. December 28, 
 1780, the town, taking into consideration the hardships undergoue 
 by those who had entered into the service of their country, and es- 
 pecially the losses they had sustained, by being paid in a depreciat- 
 ed currency, generously voted to raise their quota of men, and to 
 pay and clothe them at their own expense, allowing them 40 shill- 
 ings each, per month, in hard money, and £21 per year, also in 
 hard money, in addition to their clothes. t 
 
 Six men more were called for from this town in the following 
 summer; five to go to West Point, and one to Rhode Island, who 
 were accordingly raised, and the town granted £122 5s. in hard 
 money, (or $107,50,) to pay the same. At the same time, they 
 were required to purchase, for the use of the army, 3518/6$. of beef, 
 for which the towu granted £77, in hard money (or $256,66.) The 
 whole amount granted at this meeting, and which went to the sup- 
 port of the war, was therefore $664, 16 in hard money; which, con- 
 sidering the population of the town and the value of hard money 
 at that period, was a great sum and must have been felt as a heavy 
 burden. Previous to the June, 1778, it appears from the town 
 
 company, Capt. Amos Rice, Mr. Isaac How, Mr. Joseph Sever, Mr. Reuben 
 Babcock, and Mr. Nathan Rice. Capt. Samuel Wood, the commander of 
 the company, died September 21, 1818, aged 75 years. He was present, aud 
 received a slight wound, at the battle of Bunker Hill. The Ensign of the 
 company was Mr. Thomas Sever, now of Townsend, in this state. 
 
 *"July 13th, 1780, the town voted and granted the sum often thousand 
 pounds to pay seventeen men hind into the service, nine for the term of six 
 months, and eight for the term of three months." 
 
 t Town Records, I. p. 212. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 43 
 
 records, that this town had expended in money and service towards 
 carrying on the war £1474 14s. Id. in a depreciated currency 
 probably, the precise value of which, it is difficult now to deter- 
 mine.* 
 
 Such, we presume is no more than a fair specimen of the bur- 
 dens borne by the community in support of the war of our. Indepen- 
 dence, and of the spirit with which they were borne. 
 
 In many, very many instances indeed, the people were impov- 
 erished and brought low. But they were not disheartened; and, 
 by the smiles of a merciful Providence, their efforts were crowned 
 with complete success. Let us who have entered into ,their labors 
 not forget what we owe to that far-famed generation, who support- 
 ed the privations and hardships of a long and harrassing conflict, in 
 support of our cherished liberties.! 
 
 The number was small of those who had refused to embark in 
 the cause of liberty, the names of four only being recorded as ab- 
 sentees, whose estates were confiscated near the close of the war.j 
 
 The patriotism of two others was indeed suspected, and they 
 were subjected to a good deal of inconvenience in consequence of it.§ 
 
 * The town records contain a list of the names of 90 persons (probably 
 the whole number who paid taxes) with the amount contributed by each. 
 
 " October 30, 1780, the town granted £6660 to purchase beef for the 
 army." This 1 suppose was when the depreciation of money was nearly, or 
 quite at the lowest ebb, about which time, £2933 6s. 8d. were granted to 
 Rev. Mr. Whitney by an unanimous vote of the town, in addition to his yearly 
 salary. 
 
 "May 17, 1781, the town granted the sum of £3300 0*. Orf. to pay for 
 three horses for the use of the Continental army." 
 
 t Among the survivors of the soldiers of the revolution, in this town, five 
 received pensions from the U. States, agreeably to the law passed, April, 1818. 
 
 From all these, however, with the exception of two, one of whom has since 
 died, their pensions were withdrawn, after the modification of the law, in 1820. 
 Since that time, two of the number, reduced to poverty, have recovered their 
 pensions ; and the only remaining one from whom it was withdrawn, and 
 who, depending on the pension, had involved himself in debt in erecting a 
 small building for his accommodation, has been compelled to part with his 
 snug little farm, and is now, in his old age, reduced to the very verge of abso- 
 lute want. Such, so far as I have witnessed it, has been the operation of the 
 laws respecting pensions to Revolutionary Soldiers. It may be remarked 
 moreover, that the two to whom the pensions were continued, had been a 
 town charge, and were not regarded as very valuable members of the com- 
 munity. 
 
 JThese were James Ea?er and his son, John Eager ; and Ebenezer Cutler, 
 and Michael Martyn, sons in law of the late Capt. James Eager, of this town. 
 
 § These were John Taylor, and Sylvanus Billings. The former, a gen- 
 tleman of handsome property and who had been one of the leading men of 
 the town ; the latter also a man of considerable estate. 
 
 
44 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 After the close of the war, the embarrassments arising from the 
 want of a circulating medium, when almost all were deeply involv- 
 ed in debt, caused much uneasiness, and led the people to devise 
 measures for their removal. August 7th, 1786, Isaac Davis was 
 Chosen as a delegate to attend a County Convention, at Leicester, 
 oh the 15th inst. to whom the following, among other instructions, 
 were given by a committee appointed by the town. The delegate 
 was to use his influence "that the Convention petition his Excel- 
 lency, the Governor, and Council, to call the General Court togeth- 
 er, in the month of October next, at fartherest ; and that the Conven- 
 tion present a humble and decent petition to the General Court to 
 set up and establish a mint in the Commonwealth, &c." Complaints 
 were also made of the salaries of the civil list, being so high, and of 
 various other grievances under which the people labored.* There 
 was nothing, however, of the spirit of rebellion or insubordination 
 in the resolutions that were passed at this meeting, or in the con- 
 duct which followed ; and though it appears from the representa- 
 tions of all, that the people generally were reduced to the greatest 
 straits, yet only three or four individuals were found willing to 
 join in the rebellion of that year, and to seek redress by measures 
 
 of violence.! 
 
 Schools, &c. — Previous to the year 1766, 1 can find on record, 
 no appropriations made for the education of youth. But I am in- 
 formed that several instructors had, before that period, been em- 
 
 * There prevailed, at this time, very generally through the country, the 
 most violent prejudices against the profession of the law. One of the instruc- 
 tions given to the delegate, at this time, was, that he was to use his influence 
 in the convention, by petitioning and remonstrating to the General Court, 
 " that the whole order of Lawyers be annihilated ; for we conceive them not 
 only to be building themselves upon the ruins of the distressed, but said order 
 has increased, and is daily increasing, far beyond any olher set or order of 
 men among us, in numbers and affluence ; and we apprehend they may be- 
 come ere long somewhat dangerous to the rights and liberties of the people." 
 
 t The following is a list of the names of those who have represented this 
 town in the General Court, from 1775, to the present time. 
 
 Col. Levi Brigham, from 1775. to 1777.— John Ball, 1778, 1782, and 
 1785.— Deac. Paul Newton, 1779,' and 1780.— Deac. Seth Rice, 1783.— 
 Deac. Isaac Davis, seven years — between 1787 and 1798. — Deac. Nahum Fay, 
 1800 and 1801. — James Keyes, Esq. eighteen years, from 1802, to the present 
 time. 
 
 From the above account, it appears that this town has been represented 
 thirty six years since the commencement of the Revolutiona'y war. 
 
 The following persons have been commissioned Justices of the peace. 
 The first commission is dated July 3, 1793. Nahum Fay, Seth Grout, Isaac 
 Davis, Stephen Williams, James Keyes, Phineas Davis, and Cyrus Gale. 
 Of this number, three, Seth Grout, Isaac Davis and James Keyes, have since 
 deceased. 
 
H1ST0RV OF NORTHBOROUGH. 45 
 
 ployed to teach, at private houses, in different parts of the town, 
 and who were paid by the voluntary contributions of the parents. 
 The first school house that was erected in this town, stood on the 
 meeting house common, whence it was afterwards removed, and 
 now forms part of the dwelling house of Mr. Joel Bartlett.* In 
 1770, the district was divided into four squadrons; but it was not 
 till 1780, that the town passed a vote to build school houses in the 
 several squadrons, and granted money for that purpose. The town 
 granted £4000 for building four school houses, which, at the time 
 it wa9 expended, amounted to only £52 6s. 8d. to which they added 
 £110 6s. 8d amounting to £163 13s. Ad. 
 
 Since that period two new School districts have been formed ; 
 so that there are now six districts in the town, in each of which, a 
 school is kept from eight to twelve weeks, both winter and summer. 
 
 The following is an abstract of the return of the School com- 
 mittee, made in May last, to the General Court. 
 
 Amount paid for public Instruction, $600. 
 
 Time of keeping school in the year, 6 months each district. 
 
 Males under 7 year.,, 47 Females under 7 years, 39 
 From 7 to 14, 98 From 7 to 14, 75 
 
 From 14 and upwards, 68 From 14 and upwards, 47 
 
 Males, 213 Females, 161 
 
 213 
 
 Total, 374 
 
 There are, in this town, three respectable Libraries, containing 
 in all about 500 volumes, exclusive of the Juvenile Library, which 
 contains nearly 150 volumes, suited to children and youth. 
 
 The Juvenile Library, commenced in 1824, is supported by an 
 annual contribution, and, under a few simple regulations, is accessi- 
 ble to all the children and youth, over the age of 7 years, residing 
 in the town. 
 
 Many young men, educated in our schools, have been employed 
 as Instructors, both here and in other towns, and have generally 
 proved worthy of the confidence reposed in them. 
 
 Besides several professional gentlemen educated in our schools, 
 and in the neighboring Academies, twelve young men have receiv- 
 ed a public education, eight of whom are graduates of Harvard 
 
 * Mr. Thomas Goodenow was the first Instructor, supported at the ex- 
 pense of the town. Mr. James Hart, a foreigner, was employed about this 
 time, (1770) and is frequently spoken of as the father of the many excellent 
 penmen for which this town has, ia former years, been famed. 
 
46 HISTORY OF flORTHBOROtlGH. 
 
 University, at Cambridge, one of Brown University, and one each, 
 of Yale, Dartmouth, and Williams' Colleges. 
 
 Their names, professions, &c. are as follow : 
 
 1. Jonathan Livermore, son of the late Deac. Jonathan Liver- 
 more, was graduated at Harvard University, in 1760 ; settled in 
 the ministry at Wilton, N. H. in 1763; was dismissed, but remained 
 in that place, where he died, July, 1809, in the 80th year of his age. 
 
 2. Ebenezer Rice, son of the late Simon Rice,* was graduated 
 at Harvard University, in 1760 ; was a Physician, and a justice of 
 the peace, in Marlborough ; afterwards removed to Barre, where 
 he died. 
 
 3. Jacob Rice, son of the late Jacob Rice, was graduated at 
 Harvard University, in 1765; settled in Henniker, N. H. being the 
 first minister in that place; was dismissed, on account of ill health* 
 was installed at Brownfield, Oxford County, Me. where he remain- 
 ed till his death, which took place suddenly, Feb. 1, 1824, Lord's 
 Day, having preached to his people in the morning. 
 
 4. Elijah Brigham, son of the late Col. Levi Brigham, was 
 graduated at Dartmouth College, in 1778 1 ; commenced the study of 
 Divinity, which he soon relinquished, and engaged in mercantile 
 business with his brother in law, Breck Parkman, Esq. of Westbo- 
 tough : in 1795, he was appointed one of the Justices of the Court 
 of Common Pleas ; for several years was a Senator and Counsellor 
 of this Commonwealth, a Justice through the State, and a Repre- 
 sentative of this District in the Congress of the United States, from 
 1810 to the time of his death. Judge Brigham died suddenly, at 
 Washington, Feb. 22, 1816, aged 64. 
 
 5. John Taylor, son of the late John Taylor, was graduated at 
 Harvard University, in 1786; is now a Counsellor at Law, in North- 
 ampton, and one of the Representatives of that town in the Gen- 
 eral Court. 
 
 6. Peter Whitney, son of Rev. Peter W r hitney, was graduated 
 at Harvard University, in 1791 ; now the minister of Quincy, in 
 this State, where he was ordained, Feb. 5. 1800. 
 
 7. Henry Gassett, son of Heary Gassett, was graduated at Har- 
 vard University, in 1795 ; is now a merchant, in Boston. 
 
 8. Israel Munroe, son of Abraham Munroe, was graduated at 
 
 Harvard University, in 1800; was for some years a Counsellor at 
 
 Law, in Boston ; he now resides in the city of New York. 
 
 * Simon Rice, the father of Dr. Ebenezer Rice, was a brother of the late 
 Deac. Matthias Rice, of this town. He lived just within the limits of North- 
 borough, near the dwelling house of i'lr. Ephraim Barnard. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROU&H. 47 
 
 9. Warren Fay, son of Nahum Fay, Esq. was graduated at Har- 
 vard University, in 1807 ; ordained at Brimfield, Nov. 3, 1808 ; dis- 
 missed, June 2G, 1811 ; installed at Harvard, Jan. 26, 1814; dis- 
 missed, at his own request, Jan. 5, 1820; installed as minister of 
 the First Congregational Church and Society in Charlestovvn, Feb. 
 23, 1820. v 
 
 10. Luther Rice, son of Capt. Amos Rice, was graduated at 
 Williams College, in 1810; ordained at Salem, Feb. 6, 1812, as a 
 Missionary; sailed for Calcutta in company with Messrs. Hall & 
 Judson, Feb. 18, 1812. Soon after his arrival he changed his views 
 on the subject of baptism ; was baptised by immersion ; and, in the 
 autumn of 1813, returned to this country. He now resides in Wash- 
 ington, D. C. and is Treasurer of Columbia College. 
 
 11. John Davis, son of the Jate Isaac Davis, Esq. was graduated 
 at Yale College, in 1812; is now a Counsellor at Law, in Worcester, 
 and represents this District in the Congress of the U. S. 
 
 12. Isaac Davis, son of Phineas Davis, Esq. was graduated at 
 Brown University, in 1822; is now an Attorney at Law, in Wor- 
 cester. 
 
 There are, at present, two physicians in this place, Docts. Ste- 
 phen Ball, Sen'r. and Jun'r. The only other physician who made 
 Northborough his permanent residence, was the late Doct. Stephen 
 Ball, father of Stephen Ball, Sen'r. There has never been a law- 
 yer residing in the place, with the exception of John Winslow, 
 Esq. who remained here only a few years. And, it is a singular 
 fact, that with this exception, and that of the three successive min- 
 isters, all of whom were educated at Harvard University, none of 
 the permanent inhabitants of the town, at this or at any former pe- 
 riod, received a public and liberal education. 
 
 Ecclesiastical, &c. — Measures were taken immediately after 
 Northborough became a separate precinct, to support the public 
 worship of God, by building a church, and procuring a minister. 
 
 December 31, 1744, the parish voted to build a meeting house, 
 and to raise £50, lawful money, for that purpose. This led, as fre- 
 quently happens, to a controversy respecting the location of the 
 edifice, which, after several months 'continuance, was finally sub- 
 mitted to the arbitration of three respectable men from the neigh- 
 boring towns, Capt. Daniel Heywood, of Worcester, Capt. John 
 Haynes, of Sudbury, and Capt. Thomas Hapgood, of Shrewsbury, 
 who fixed on the spot, near the site of the present church. The 
 land on which the house was erected, was given to the town for 
 
48 HISTORY' OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 the use of its inhabitants, by Capt. James Eager, by a deed bear- 
 ing date April 26, 1745, "so long as the said inhabitants of the 
 north precinct shall improve said land for the standing of a meeting 
 house for the public worship of God." 
 
 The committee reported, April 24, 1745 ; and, on April 30, only 
 6 days after, the house was raised ; a vote having previously pas- 
 sed, that fc < every man should provide for the raising as he was 
 spirited."* 
 
 New difficulties now arose respecting the settlement of a minis- 
 ter. Several candidates had been employed ; and, as usually hap- 
 pens in such cases, the minds of the people were divided between 
 them. Under these circumstances, the precinct appointed a fast 
 for the 12th Sept. 1745, and sent for five of the neighboring minis- 
 ters " to give them their advice who they should apply to for can- 
 didates, in order to a choice." 
 
 The following gentlemen attended on the occasion ; viz. Rev. 
 Mr. Prentice, Rev. Mr. Parkman, Rev. Mr. Cushing, and Rev. Mr. 
 Morse, who recommended that the parish should hear a few sab- 
 baths each, two candidates from Cambridge, Rev. Mr. Rand, and 
 Mr. Jedediah Adams, in order to a choice. Mr. John Martyn was 
 one of the candidates, who had previously been employed by the 
 parish ; and although they complied with the advice of the neigh- 
 boring ministers, so far as to hear the other candidates two sab- 
 baths each, vet on the 19th of December, 1745, "Mr. John Mar- 
 tyn was chosen by a clear vote" ; and a salary was offered him of 
 £50 in bills of the last emission, (which was at 7s. 6d. per ounce,) 
 or £200 in bills of the old form and tenor, after the rate of silver 
 at 30s. per ounce, or in other bills of public credit, equivalent to 
 the said sum, and to be paid at two payments annually." Besides 
 this, a settlement of $300, old tenor, was voted by the parish. 
 
 Mr. Martyq accepted the invitation, and was ordained, May 21, 
 1746, O. S. a church having been gathered on the same day, con- 
 sisting often brethren, besides the pastor elect, four of whom, it is 
 worthy of notice, were foreigners.! 
 
 * The dimensions of the first meeting house were 46 feet by 36. The 
 whole cost of finishing the outside was £443 11*. 2d. The building commit- 
 tee consisted of Capt. James Eager, Wm. Holloway, and Jesse Brigham. 
 The house was framed by Daniel Hemminway. The price of labor at this 
 time, was, in the old tenor currency, for a man per day scoring timber, 6*. for 
 hewing, 6s. 6d. for carpenter's work, 8s. White pine timber, 3 pence per 
 foot ; for oak, 2£ pence, running measure. " Allowed Jotham Bartlett £2 
 10*. for two barrels of cider at the raising of the meeting house." 
 
 t The following are the names of the persons who subscribed to the church 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 49 
 
 The ordaining council consisted of the following pastors, with 
 their delegates : 
 
 Rev. Mr. Parkman, of Westborough, who preached on the oc- 
 casion, from Heb. xiii. 17; Rev. Mr. Prentice, of Lancaster, who 
 gave the charge; Rev. Mr. Cushing, of Shrewsbury, who expressed 
 the fellowship of the Churches; Rev. Mr. Loring, of Sudbury; Rev. 
 Mr. Hall, of Sutton; Rev. Mr. Gardner, of Stow; and Rev. Mr. Bar- 
 rett, of Hopkinton. 
 
 Although the ceremonies of the ordination took place in the 
 meeting house, yet it appears from the town records that it was in 
 a very unfinished state, having neither pulpit, galleries, glass win- 
 dows, nor even permanent floors. It was not till June, in the fol- 
 lowing year, that a vote could be obtained " to glaze the meeting 
 house and lay the floors ;" and not till the next autumn, that the 
 pulpit and gallery stairs were built. This was indeed the day of 
 small things ; and when we compare the accommodations of the 
 spacious and elegant temple since erected near the spot, with the 
 loose floors, and rough seats, and open windows of the house in 
 which our fathers worshipped, we shall do well to inquire wheth- 
 er we surpass them as much in the punctuality of our attendance, 
 and the spirituality of our worship, as in the beauty and accommo- 
 dations of the place of our solemnities. 
 
 Northborough became an incorporated district, Jan. 24, 1766, 
 not long after which, viz. April 30, 1767, the Rev. John Martyn, 
 after a short illness, departed this life, in the 61st year of his age, 
 and the 21st of his ministry. His wife died, Sept. 8, 1775, aged 70, 
 
 Mr. Martyn was a son of Capt. Edward Martyn, of Boston, 
 where he spent his early life, under the care of an excellent moth- 
 er, who had been left a widow in easy circumstances, some time 
 previous to young Mr. Martyn's entering colfege. Mr. Martyn 
 was graduated at Harvard University, in 1724. For several years 
 after he left college, he devoted his attention to secular pursuits, 
 and was for some time an inhabitant of Harvard, in this county.* 
 
 covenant at this time. — John Martyn, the pastor elect ; Ephraim Allen ; Josh- 
 ua Dowsing, (sometimes written Townsend) from England ; John McAllester, 
 from Ireland ; Jonathan Livermore, (afterwards Deac. Livermore ;) Gershom 
 Fay ; Matthias Rice, (afterwards Deac. Rice ;) Samuel Allen ; Jacob Shep- 
 herd, a foreigner ; John Carruth, also a foreigner ; and Silas Fay. 
 
 * Rev. Mr. Martyn was married to Miss Mary Marret, of Cambridge, by 
 whom he had the following children : John, who lived in this town ; Mary, 
 married to a Minot, of Concord ; Michael, who was married to Zilpah, daugh- 
 ter of James Eager, and lived in this town till the commencement of the rev- 
 
50 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 At length, at the age of 40, he directed his attention to Theo- 
 logical pursuits, and became an able, faithful, and useful minister. 
 He possessed, in a large measure, the confidence and affections of 
 his flock, was honored in his life, and deeply lamented at his death. 
 
 Rev. Peter Whitney was the only person employed as a candi- 
 date in this place between the death of Mr. Martyn and his own 
 ordination. 
 
 Mr. Martyn died the last day of April ; and, after an interval of 
 only 6 months and 4 days, that is, on the 4th of the following No- 
 vember, his successor was inducted into the office of a christian 
 minister.* 
 
 The services at his ordination were performed by the follow- 
 ing persons. Rev. Mr. Morse, of the second church in Shrewsbu- 
 ry, (now Boylston) made the Introductory Prayer ; Rev. Mr. Whit- 
 ney, of Petersham, the father of the candidate, preached from Mat- 
 thew, xxviii. 19, 20.; Rev. Mr. Parktnan, of Westborough, made 
 the consecrating prayer, and gave the charge ; Rev. Mr. Smith, of 
 Marlborough, expressed the fellowship of the churches; and Rev. 
 Mr. Bridge, of Chelmsford, made the concluding prayer. The 
 other ministers on the ordaining council, were, Rev. Mr. Stone, of 
 Southborough; Rev. Mr. Goss, of Bolton ; Rev. Mr. Morrell, of 
 Wilmington ; Rev. Mr. Davis, of Holden ; Rev. Mr. Woodward, of 
 Weston ; Rev. Mr. Clark, of Lexington ; Rev. Mr. Sumner, of 
 Shrewsbury; and Rev. Mr. Cummings, of Billerica. 
 
 The salary of Rev. Mr. Whitney was £66 13s. 4d. with a set- 
 tlement of £160, lawful money. 
 
 Rev. Peter Whitney was the son of Rev. Aaron Whitney, the 
 first minister of Petersham, was born Sept. 17, 1744. He was grad- 
 uated at Harvard University, 1762, where he pursued his Theologi- 
 cal studies preparatory to entering on the work of the ministry. 
 
 Distinguished for the urbanity of his manners, easy and familiar 
 in his intercourse with his people, hospitable to strangers, and al- 
 ways ready to give a hearty welcome to his numerous friends ; 
 punctual to his engagements, observing an exact method in the dis- 
 tribution of his time, having a time for every thing and doing every 
 thing in its time, without hurry or confusion; conscientious in the 
 
 olutionary war ; Richard, who settled in Windsor, Conn. ; and Nathaniel, 
 who removed to one of the Southern States. Widow Abigail Fay, is the 
 daughter of John, abovenatned, and is now living in this place. 
 
 * Mr. Whitney began to preach in Northborongh, June 7, 1767, and gave 
 his auswer to settle the 12th of the following October. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROCGH. 51 
 
 discharge of his duties as a christian minister, catholic in his prin- 
 ciples and in his conduct, always taking an interest in whatever 
 concerned the prosperity of the town and the interests of religion, 
 he was, for many years, the happy minister of a kind and an affec- 
 tionate people. At length, having continued in the work of the 
 ministry almost half a century, he suddenly departed this life, Feb- 
 ruary 29, 1816, in the 72d year of his age, and the 49th of his use- 
 ful ministry.* 
 
 Mr. Whitney was married to Miss Julia Lambert, of Reading, in 
 this state, by whom he had ten children who lived to man's estate, 
 eight of whom still survive. 
 
 Mrs. Whitney survived her husband nearly five years, and died 
 at Quincy, while on a visit to her children, Jan. 10, 1821, aged 79 
 years. All who knew Madam Whitney will bear testimony to her 
 worth ; and admit that she possessed, in no common measure, dig- 
 nity of manners, sprightliness of mind, and goodness of heart. She 
 was indeed a most pleasant companion and a most valuable friend. 
 
 The writer of these sketches was the only candidate employed 
 by their society after the death of his immediate predecessor ; and 
 after a probation of about four months, was ordained their minister, 
 Oct. 30, 1816. t His salary is $600 per annum. 
 
 * Rev. Mr. Martyn left none of his writings in print. His successor made 
 himself extensively known by his History of Worcester County ; a work high- 
 ly valuable for the facts it records, many of which would probably have been 
 lost, had they not, with great pains and fidelity, been collected and embodied 
 in this work. It is a work, the value of which will not be diminished by the 
 more minute histories now publishing in the Worcester Magazine and Histori- 
 cal Journal. 
 
 The other printed writings of Mr. Whitney, so far as they have come to 
 my knowledge, are — Two Discourses, delivered July 4, 1774 ; a Sermon, de- 
 livered at a Lecture, July 4, 1776, on publishing the Declaration of Indepen- 
 dence ; a half Century Sermon, preached June 1, 1796 ; a Sermon at the or- 
 dination of his son, Rev. Peter Whitney, of Quincy, February 5, 1800 ; a Ser- 
 mon preached at Shrewsbury, February 16, 1810, at the funeral of Mrs. Lucy 
 Sumner, wife of the Rev. Joseph Sumner, D. D. ; and a notice of a remarka- 
 ble apple tree, in the first volume of the Memoirs of the American Academy 
 of Arts and Sciences. 
 
 The publication of the History of Worcester County recommended the 
 author to the notice of the Massachusetts Historical Society, who elected him 
 a member of that association. 
 
 t The ordination services were performed by the following persons : — 
 Rev. Mr. Whitney, of Quincy, made the Introductory Prayer; Rev. Prof. 
 Ware, of Harvard University, preached from Jer. xv. 19 ; Rev. Pres. Kirk- 
 land, of H. U. made the Consecrating Prayer; Rev. Dr. Saunders, of Med- 
 field, gave the charge ; R,ev. John E. Abbott, of Salem, gave the Right hand 
 of Fellowship ; Rev. Dr. Puffer, of Berlin, made the Concluding Prayer. Be- 
 sides the above, the following Ministers were on the Council : Rev. Dr. Sum- 
 ner, of Shrewsbury ; Rev. Dr. Bancroft, of Worcester ; Rev. Dr. Thayer, of 
 
 7 
 
52 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 It appears, therefore, that from the ordination of Rev. Mr. Mar- 
 tyn, in 1746, to the present time, a period of 80 years, this chris- 
 tian society has been destitute of a settled minister only about 14 
 months; a fact highly creditable to the members of this society, as 
 an evidence of their regard for the institutions of religion, and of 
 the union and harmony which have long subsisted among them. 
 And it may justly be considered, that the town is indebted to the 
 spirit of union which has hitherto so generally prevailed among us, 
 lor the respectable rank which it now maintains. It would be easy, 
 however painful, to predict the consequences of the prevalence of 
 an opposite spirit. Large and opulent societies can bear to be re- 
 duced by division. Eut in societies small as this, and whose re- 
 sources are no greater than ours, union should be the watchword of 
 all who wish well to the cause of human improvement. 
 
 It is worthy of remark, that there has never been but one reli- 
 gious society in this town, and that only a very few families have, 
 at any time, withdrawn themselves from the Congregational socie- 
 ty. Four or five families of the Baptist denomination usually at- 
 tend public worship in the adjoining towns. The first person of 
 this denomination in this town, was Thomas Billings, who joined 
 the Baptist Society, in Leicester, in 1766. 
 
 The increase of wealth and population, and a regard for the in- 
 stitutions of religion, led the inhabitants of this town, in the spring 
 and summer of 1808, to erect a new and more spacious house for 
 public worship. 
 
 The new Church is 56 ft. square, with a projection of 34 ft. by 
 15, surmounted by a tower, and cost, including the bell, $11,408 04. 
 The cost of the bell was $510 00 ; its weight about 1200 lbs. 
 
 The proportions of this building are much admired by persons 
 ef good taste ; and its location is such, that it appears to great ad- 
 vantage from the main road. May it long stand ; and be to this So- 
 ciety a bond of union, and the place whither they shall delight to 
 bring their stated offerings of prayer and praise.* 
 
 Lancaster; Rev. Mr. Packard, of Marlborough; Rev. Mr. Rockwood, of 
 Westborough ; Rev. Mr. Cotton, of Boylston ; Rev. Mr. Frothingham, of 
 Boston ; Rev. Mr. Ripley, of Waltham ; and Rev. Mr. Damon, of Lunenburg. 
 Rev. J. Allen was bom in Medfield, August 15, 1790, and was graduated at 
 Harvard University, in 1811. 
 
 * The committee for building the new meeting house consisted of the fol- 
 lowing persons ; James Keyes, Esq. Stephen Williams, Esq. Isaac Davis, Esq. 
 Hollon Maynard, Col. William Eager, Seth Grout, Esq. Asaph Rice, and 
 Phineas Davis, Esq. The business was committed lo a sub-committee, com- 
 posed of three; S. Williams, Esq. Asaph Rice, and Phineas Davis, Esq. The 
 house was built by Col. Eames, of Buckland, andCapt. Brooks, of Princeton. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. _- 53 
 
 In the summer of 1822, a neat and handsome Town House was 
 built, at the cost of about $1000, which is used for town meetings, 
 singing schools, and various other purposes. 
 
 This town has been peculiarly unfortunate in the destruction of 
 buildings by lire. No fewer than ten dwelling houses, in this small 
 town, seven of them large, two story buildings, have been burnt to 
 the ground. Besides these, two school houses, one grist mill, one 
 saw mill, and one shoe-makers's shop, have fallen a prey to the 
 same devouring element. 
 
 In respect to expenses incurred for the support of paupers, the 
 town has for the most part been highly favored. Since the com- 
 mencement of the present year, only two persons have been a town 
 charge, the whole expense ot maintaining whom, for a year, is less 
 than one hundred dollars. 
 
 Some additional particulars relating to the ecclesiastical and se- 
 cular affairs of this town, it may be proper to include in these his- 
 torical sketches. Owing to the destruction of the church records, 
 in the year 1780, when the dwelling house of Rev. Mr. Whitney, 
 with most of its contents, was destroyed by fire, we have no means 
 of ascertaining the number of baptisms and of persons, who joined 
 the church, as well as many other particulars, which' it might be in- 
 teresting to know, of what took place previous to that date. We 
 learn, however, from Rev. Mr. Parkman's account of Westborough, 
 that, in 1767, the year of the Rev. Mr. Martyn's death, that the 
 number of communicants was forty four, 21 males, and 23 females. 
 The whole number of persons admitted into the church, during the 
 ministry of Mr. Whitney, as nearly as can be ascertained, was 204, 
 Since the death of Mr. Whitney, 54 have been added to the church, 
 exclusive of such as have been received by recommendation from 
 other churches. Besides these, 84 persons, during the ministry of 
 Mr. Whitney, owned the baptismal covenant. 
 
 The number of persons baptised, from 1780 to the time of Mr. 
 Whitney's decease, was 661 ; from that period to the present, 132. 
 
 From the gathering of this church, in 1746, to the present time, 
 seven persons only have sustained the oflke of deacons, two of 
 whom yet survive. 
 
 The two first deacons of this church were Jonathan Livermore 
 and Matthias Rice. Deac. Livermore resigned, October 2d, 1782; 
 died April 21, 1801, aged 100 years and 7 months. Deac. Rice 
 died February 13, 1764, aged 58 years. Deac. Rice was succeed- 
 ed by Paul Newton, who resigned May 8, 1795, and died May 18. 
 
54 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROTJGH. 
 
 1797, aged 79. Deac. Liverraore was succeeded by Seth Rice, 
 who resigned April 30, 1807, and died Jan. 2, 1815, aged 77. 
 Deac. Newton was succeeded by Isaac Davis, who resigned Nov. 
 18, 1825, and died April 27, 1826, aged 77. Deac. Rice was suc- 
 ceeded by Nahum Fay, and Deac. Davis by Jonas Bartlett. Deac. 
 Fay came into office June 14, 1807, and Deac. Bartlett, February 
 26, 1826. 
 
 The amount of the ages of the five deacons who have deceas- 
 ed, is 392 years, the average of which exceeds 78 years. 
 
 In giving the history of this town, it will be proper that we sub- 
 join a brief notice of those persons who have distinguished them- 
 selves as its benefactors. It has already been mentioned that the 
 land on which the meeting house stands, with the adjoining com- 
 mon, was the donation of Capt. James Eager, of whom an account 
 was given in a former part of these sketches. 
 
 Mrs. Martyn, the mother of the Rev. John Martyn, at first, 
 wholly supplied furniture for the communion table. Rabbi Judah 
 Monis, formerly a Hebrew Instructer, in Harvard University, gave 
 to this church a silver cup, also a large silver tankard, afterwards 
 converted into two cups. Another silver cup was procured, with 
 the joint legacies of Capt. J. Eager and Lieut. William Holloway. 
 A silver tankard was given by Anna, relict of Deac. Matthias Rice. 
 Another silver cup was given by Pelatiah Rice, and his son in law, 
 Thaddeus Fay. Another by Capt. Gideon Tenny ; and recently, 
 one by the late Deac. Isaac Davis. An elegant Folio Bible, in 2 
 vols, for the use of the pulpit, was the generous donation of Jo- 
 seph Foster, Esq. of Cambridge.* 
 
 * Rabbi Judah Monis was a native of Italy, born in 1683 or 1684. Of 
 his parentage, and of the circumstances which led him to emigrate to Ameri- 
 ca, we have no account. He was employed as an instructer in the Hebrew 
 language, in Harvard University, about the year 1720, before his conversion 
 to Christianity. At length, he was led to receive Jesus Christ as the true 
 Messiah : and, March 27, 1722, was publicly baptised at Cambridge ; the 
 Rev. Dr. Benjamin Colman, of Boston, preaching a discourse in the College 
 Hall on the occasion, from John, v. 46. In the preface to this discourse, the 
 author says, that " it was prepared in obedience to the desire of the very Rev. 
 Mr. Leverett, the present learned Head and President of the House where it 
 was delivered, in case of the absence of the aged and venerable Dr. Increase 
 Mather, 11 who, he adds, " if his years had permitted him, would have presid- 
 ed and served on so great a solemnity. 11 " As to Mr. Monis himself, 11 Dr. 
 Colman writes, " it must be confessed that he seems a very valuable prose- 
 lyte. He is truly read and learned in the Jewish Cabbala, and Rabbins, a 
 Master and Critic in the Hebrew : He reads, speaks, writes, and interprets it 
 with great readiness and accuracy, and is truly didaktichns, apt to teach. 
 His diligence and industry, together with his ability, is manifest unto many 
 who have seen his Grammar and Nomenclator, Hebrew and English ; as also 
 his Translation of the Creed and Lord^ Prayer: the thirty nine articles of the 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 55 
 
 Appendix I. Containing a list of persons who were heads of 
 families in this place before or soon after it became a separate Pre- 
 
 Church of England, and the Assembly's shorter Catechism into Hebrew ; and 
 be is now translating the larger Catechism." On the same occasion, Mr. 
 Monis also delivered a discourse from Ps. cxvi. 10, entitled " The Truth," 
 which was printed, with a Preface written by Dr. Increase Mather. This 
 was followed soon afterwards by two other discourses from the same text, the 
 first entitled "The Whole Truth," the latter, "Nothing but the Truth." 
 These three discourses, with that of Dr. Colman, were printed in Boston, for 
 Daniel Henchman, and "sold at his shop, over against the old Erick Church, 
 in Cornhill, 1722." 
 
 Mr. Monis continued in his office as an Instructer in Hebrew forty years, 
 till the infirmities of age rendered him incapable of performing its duties. 
 After the death of his wife, in 1761, he left Cambridge and removed to North- 
 borough to reside in the family of Rev. Mr. Martyn, who had married a sister 
 of his wife. Here he remained till the time of his death, which happened, 
 April 25, 1764, at the age of 81 years. As he had no children, he bequeath- 
 ed the principal part of his estate, which was considerable, to the family in 
 which he resided at his death. The sum of £46 13*. Ad. was distributed 
 among seven of the neighboring ministers ; and about £126 was left as a fund, 
 under the direction of a Board of Trustees, the interest of which was to be 
 devoted to the relief of indigent widows of deceased clergymen. The Board 
 of Trustees consists of the ministers of the following churches : The church 
 in Northborouejh ; the first church in Salem ; first in Cambridge ; the new 
 north in Boston ; and the first church in Hingham. The fund now amounts 
 to $400, the interest of which is distributed annually among four widows of 
 deceased clergymen. 
 
 The following is the inscription on Mr. Monis'' Grave Stone. 
 
 "here lie buried the remains oe 
 
 RABBI JUDAH MONIS, 
 
 Late Hebrew Instructer, 
 
 At Harvard College, in Cambridge ; 
 
 In which office he continued 40 years. 
 
 He was by birth and religion a Jew, 
 
 But embraced the Christian faith, 
 
 And was publicly baptised 
 
 At Cambridge, A. D. 1722, 
 
 And departed this life 
 
 April 25th, 1764, 
 
 Aged eighty one years, two months, 
 
 and twenty one days. 
 
 A native branch of Jacob see, 
 
 Which once from off its olive broke ; 
 Regrafted from the living tree, Rom. xi. 17.24. 
 
 Of the reviving sap partook. 
 
 From teeming Zion's fertile womb, Isai. lxvi. 3. 
 
 As dewy drops in early morn, Ps. ex. 3. 
 Or rising bodies from the tomb, John, v. 28. 29. 
 
 At once be Israel's nation born. Isai. lxvi. 8." 
 
 Lieut. Wm, Holloway, of whose family an account has been given, was 
 for many years, one of the leading characters in this town. He died Jan. 6, 
 1760, aged 71. 
 
 Deac. Matthias Rice was a grandson of Edward Rice, one of the origin- 
 
5G 
 
 HISTORY OF NORTHE0R0UGH. 
 
 cinct, in 1744. The second column contains the names of the per- 
 sons who now live on or near the same house lots. 
 
 Those to whose names this mark (t) is prefixed, have descend- 
 ants of the same name now living in Northborough. 
 
 John Brigham. 
 Samuel Goodenow, 
 Samuel Goodenow, Jun. 
 
 David and Jonathan, sons of i 
 Samuel Goodenow, Jim. J 
 Nathaniel Oakes, 
 Simeon Howard, Sen. 
 t Gershom Fay, Sen. 
 Thomas Ward, 
 Oliver? Ward, (1) 
 Dtac. Isaac Tomblin, 
 Hezekiah Tomblin, 
 Ephraim Beeman, 
 Joseph Wheeler, 
 Simon Rice, 
 t Daniel Bartlett, (2) 
 
 Mr. Holbrooks Saw Mill, 
 Gill Bartlett. 
 
 Deac. Jonas Eaillett, 
 
 Gill Bartlett. 
 
 Jacob Pcirce. 
 
 Near the Hearse House. 
 
 Near Asa Fay's House. 
 
 Asaph Rice. 
 
 Jonathan Bartlett. 
 
 Widow of the late Deac. Davis. 
 
 On Tomblin Hill. 
 
 Samuel DaJrymple. 
 
 On Ball's Hill. 
 
 Near Ephraim Barnard's. 
 
 Deac. Jonas Bartlett. 
 
 None of the above, it is believed were heads of families in this town so 
 late as 1744. 
 
 The following are the names of the fifteen persons who paid 
 
 the highest taxes in 1749, taken from the Town Record, Vol. I. p. 27. 
 
 Lieut. Wm. Holloway, 
 James Eager, Jun. 
 Capt. James Eager, 
 Deac. Matthias Rice, 
 Peletiah Rice, 
 Samuel Gamwell, 
 t Jacob Rice. (3) 
 t Jotham Bartlett, 
 Timothy Fay, 
 Josiah Bowker, 
 i" Jesse Brigham, (4) 
 tBezaleel Fager, (5) 
 
 Stephen Williams, Esq. 
 
 John Fisk. 
 
 Do. 
 
 Windsor Stratton. 
 
 Ephraim Barnard. 
 
 Capt. Prentice Keyes. 
 
 Asaph Rice, 
 
 Gill Bartlett. 
 
 Capt. Henry Hastings. 
 
 Nathan Green. 
 
 Henry Brigham. 
 
 Col. Wm. Eager; 
 
 al proprietors of Marlborough. He lived on the farm now owned by Jonah 
 Brigham. He died without children, Feb. 3, 1764, aged 58. 
 
 Peletiah Rice was a son o! Peter Puce, of Marlborough, and lived on the 
 farm now in the possession of Ephraim Barnard. He left no sons ; his two 
 daughters, Thankful and Sarah, were married respectively, to Thaddeus and 
 Adam Fay, sons of Gershom Fay. He died April 7, 1775, aged 81. 
 
 Deac. Isaac Davis was born in Rutland, in this county. His father, Si- 
 mon Davis, was a son of Simon Davis, who removed from Concord to Rutland. 
 Rev. Joseph Davis, the first minister of Holden, was another son of Simon Da- 
 vis, Sen. I>ac. Davis removed to Northborough during the Revolutionary 
 war, and has been, for a long succession of years, one of our most distinguish- 
 ed citizens. His first wife, the mother of his children, was a daughter of the 
 late Dr. Samuel Brigham, of Marlborough, who was married to a daughter of 
 Dr. Benjamin Gott, whose wife was Sarah, a daughter of Rev. Robert Breck, 
 the second minister of Marlborough. Deac. Davis died April 27, 1826, aged 
 77. During his last sickness, he directed his family to procure at his expense 
 new linen for the Communion Table, a direction with which they cheerfully 
 complied. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH, 
 
 57 
 
 Silas Fay, 
 Thomas Billings, 
 John Oakes, 
 
 The following' twelve names w 
 
 tJames Call, 
 Cornet Simeon Howard, 
 t Nathan Ball, 
 t Josiah Rice, 
 t Gershom Fay, 
 t Samuel Allen, 
 John McAllester, 
 Deac. Jonas Livermone, 
 Thomas Gooclenow, 
 Seth Hudson, 
 George Oakes, 
 t Seth Rice, Sen: 
 
 To the above list the following 
 
 John Martyn, Jun. 
 Zephaniah Brings, 
 tDeac. Paul Newton, 
 t Col. Levi Brigham, (6) 
 t Samuel Wood, Sen. (7) 
 tThomas Warren, and his ) . . 
 
 son tEliphalet Warren, $ '- -' 
 Jonathan Hayward, and his 
 
 son Gideon Hayward, 
 tJonathan Bruce, 
 Joshua Townsend, 
 t John Carruth, 
 t William Babcock, 
 Josiah Goddard, 
 Solomon Goddard, 
 Silas Rice, 
 
 Samuel Gamwell, Jun. 
 "William Carruth, 
 George Smith, 
 Joshua Child, 
 Warren, 
 Capt. Timothy Brigham, 
 
 now living, 
 
 Capt. Henry Hastings. 
 Col. John Crawford. 
 Joel Gassett. 
 
 ere added, in 1752. 
 
 Edward B. Ball. 
 Nahum Fay, Esq. 
 Nathan Ball. 
 William Maynard. 
 Benjamin Rice. 
 Samuel Allen. 
 Hollou Maynard. 
 David Dinsmore. 
 Stephen Howe. 
 Near Ephraim Barnard's. 
 Luther Hawse. 
 Calviu Hastings. 
 
 names may be subjoined. 
 
 Benjamin Munroe. 
 Capt. Joseph Davis. 
 Martyn Newton. 
 Winslow Brigham. 
 Sarcnul Sever. 
 
 Abel Warren. 
 
 Lowell Holbrook. 
 
 Samuel Dalrymple. 
 
 John F. Fay. 
 
 Joseph Carruth. 
 David Mahan. 
 Silas Bailey. 
 Jonas Babcock. 
 Benjamin Flagg. 
 Reuben Babcock. 
 Daniel Smith. 
 Do. 
 
 On the South Road. 
 Do. 
 
 Oliver Eager. 
 
 NOTES. 
 Brief notices of several persons whose names are found in the foregoing list. 
 
 1. Oliver ? Ward. I understand that a farmer of the name of Ward, 
 was the first settler on the farm of Jonathan Bartlett, and I conclude that his 
 name was Oliver from the circumstances that, in 1710, forty three acres of 
 land were laid out to Thomas and Oliver Ward " on Woody Hill, near the 
 upper end of Cold Harbor, north side of the brook, next John Brigham's 
 meadow." 
 
 2. Daniel Bartlett, was a son of Henry Bartlett, who emigrated from 
 Wales and settled in Marlborough, in the latter part of the seventeenth or 
 beginning of the eighteenth Century. He was the common ancestor of all 
 of that name in this town. His sons were Jotham, settled in this town, 
 grandfather of Gill Bajtlett ; Daniel, settled in Rutland ; Jonathan, father of 
 
58 HISTORY OF NORTHEOROUGH. 
 
 Jotham and Jonathan, in this town ; John, in Princeton ; Isaac, in H olden ; 
 and Jonas, father of Deac. Jonas B. in this town. A brother of Daniel set- 
 tled in Western or Brookfield, probably the Benjamin Bartlett, whose daugh- 
 ter Mary, born 1701, was the first child born in Brookfield, whose birth was 
 recorded. (1 Hist. Col. 1, 267.) 
 
 3. Jacob Rice, son of Jacob Rice of Marlborough, first lived a little 
 south of the dwelling house of Doct. Stephen Ball, afterwards removed to the 
 house now owned by his grandson, Asaph Rice. He was the father of John 
 Rice, of Shrewsbury ; Jacob, minister of Brownfield, .Maine ; and Amos, now 
 living in this town. The brothers of Jacob were Amos and Obediah, of Brook- 
 field, and Gershom, of Marlborough. Jacob Rice died, July 29, 1788, aged 81. 
 
 4. Capt. Jesse Brigham, son of Jonathan Brigham of Marlborough, was 
 the father of Artemas, and Capt. Tim. Brigham, the latter of whom is now 
 living in this town. Jesse Brigham died, Dec. 8, 1796, aged 87. 
 
 5. Capt. Bezaleel Eager, came from Marlborough to the place where his 
 grandson, Col. Win. Eager now lives. Two brothers, Abraham and Capt. 
 Benjamin Eager, came about the same time to Shrewsbury, and were among 
 the first settlers of that town. Their father or grandfather was from Concord; 
 Bezaleel Eager, died Oct. 31, 1787, aged 74. 
 
 6. Col. Levi Brigham, son of David Brigham of Westborough, was the 
 father of the late Judge Brigham, and of Winslow Brigham now living in this 
 town. Col. Brigham was chosen July 10, 1775, to represent this town in the 
 Assembly to be convened at the meeting house in Watertown, the 19th of that 
 month. He died Feb. 1, 1787, aged 71. 
 
 7. Samuel Wood came from Sudbury, and set up the first fulling mill in this 
 town. He was the father of the late Abraham and Capt. Samuel Wood, who 
 lived together on the same farm now in the possession of Samuel Sever. 
 
 8. Thomas Warren, from Watertown, was the father of Eliphalet, who 
 left many descendents in this town and in other places. 
 
 Appendix II. Referring to page 134. The Grants for house 
 lots were made 26th November. 1660, and were in the following- 
 proportions. 
 
 
 Jlcres. 
 
 
 Acres. 
 
 Edmund Rice 
 
 50 
 
 Richard Ward 
 
 18 
 
 William W r ard 
 
 50 
 
 John Woods 
 
 30 
 
 John Ruddock 
 
 50 
 
 John Maynard 
 
 23 
 
 Thomas Goodenow 
 
 32 
 
 Peter King 
 
 22 
 
 Joseph Rice 
 
 32 
 
 Benjamin Rice 
 
 24 
 
 Samuel Rice 
 
 21 
 
 A Minister 
 
 30 
 
 Christopher Bannister 
 
 16 
 
 Peter Bent 
 
 30 
 
 Thomas King 
 
 39 
 
 John Bellows 
 
 20 
 
 William Kerley 
 
 30 
 
 Abraham How 
 
 25 
 
 Solomon Johnson 
 
 30 
 
 Thomas Goodenow Jun. 20 
 
 Richard Newton 
 
 30 
 
 John Rutter 
 
 30 
 
 John Howe, Sen. 
 
 30 
 
 John Barrett 
 
 18 
 
 John Howe Jun. 
 
 16 
 
 John Rediat 
 
 22 
 
 Henry Kerley 
 
 19£ 
 
 A Smith 
 
 30 
 
 Richard Barnes 
 
 16 
 
 Joseph Holmes 
 
 18 
 
 Thomas Rice 
 
 35 
 
 Samuel How 
 
 16 
 
 Andrew Belcher 
 
 20 
 
 Henry Axtell 
 
 15 
 
 Obadiah Ward 
 
 21 
 
 John Newton 
 
 16 
 
 Edward Rice 
 
 35 
 
 38 house lots, 
 
 992£ acres 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 59 
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Brief notices of several persons whose names are found in the foregoing list. 
 
 Edmund Rice was probably the father of Edmund Rice, one of the first 
 settlers of Westborough, whose children Silas and Timothy were taken by the 
 Indians and carried iuto captivity. If so, he was the great grandfather of the 
 late Deac. Seth Rice of this town. He was one of the selectmen of Marlbo- 
 rough, in 1661. 
 
 Wm. Ward was one of the first deacons of the Church at Marlborough, 
 and had a house lot assigned him on the south side of the road opposite the 
 Rev. Mr. BrimsmeadV He was one of the selectmen in 1661. He was the 
 grandfather of the late Col. William Ward, of Southborough. He was proba- 
 bly also an ancestor of the late Maj. Gen. Artemas Ward, of Shrewsbury. 
 There were, however, three persons of the name of Ward, viz. William, Obe- 
 diah, and Richard, to whom house lots in Marlborough were granted at this 
 time, (1662.) From the following inscription on a grave stone in the old bu- 
 rying ground in Marlborough, it would appear that the person to whom it 
 belongs, was born before either of the New Englaud colonies was planted. 
 " Here lyes the body of Elizabeth Ward, the servant of the Lord, deceased in 
 37 year of her age, December the 9 in the year of our Lord 1700. 
 
 John Ruddock, was one of the selectmen of Marlborough, also a recorder 
 or clerk in 1661, and a deacon of the church in 1689. 
 
 Of Thomas Gooclenow, Richard Newton and John How, some account 
 has already been given. Thomas Goodenow and John How, were selectmen 
 in 1661, as also were Thomas King and Solomon Johnson, the latter of whom 
 was afterwards a deacon of the church. 
 
 The name of Andrew Belcher, occurs in Dr. Holmes' History of Cam- 
 bridge, (1. Hist. Col. Vol. VII. 23, 34,) who quotes from the Town Records 
 the following: " The townsmen granted liberty to Andrew Belcher, to sell 
 beare and bread, for entertainment of strangers, and the good of the town." 
 This was in 1652. Whether this is the same person whose name is found 
 among the proprietors of Marlborough eight years afterwards, I am unable to 
 say. A Capt. Andrew Belcher is said to have given to the first parish in 
 Cambridge, the bell now in use, in the year 1700. I am informed too that 
 the name of Andrew Belcher, Esq. frequently occurs in the records of the 
 Gen. Court ; that he was for some years an assistant, a member of the King's 
 Council, and often a member of the Legislature; and that, in 1689, he was 
 a messenger to treat with the Indians at Albany, &c. It is not improbable 
 that he lived for a time at Marlborough, and that he afterwards returned to 
 Cambridge, and sustained the several offices abovementioned. 
 
 Edward Rice was a deacon of the church in 1689 ; and was, as has been 
 mentioned, the grandfather of the late Deac. Matthias Rice, of Simon Rice, 
 and of Jacob Rice, of this town. It is not improbable, taking into view the 
 connexion between Sudbury and Concord, that the Richard R.ice, who is 
 mentioned as one of the first settlers of Concord, in 1635, (1. Hist. Col. Vol. 
 1, 240.) was the common ancestor of all of that name in this part of the coun- 
 try, and the person, who, as tradition says, left eight sons, who all lived to a 
 very great age. The Rice family has been remarkable for longevity-. 
 
 8 
 
60 HISTORY OF HORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 Two of this name, Cyprian and Elisha Rice, who went from Marlborough, di- 
 ed at Brookfield in 1788, the one in the 98th, and the other in the 99th year of 
 his age. Hist. Col. 1. 273. 
 
 Of the other persons mentioned in the foregoing list, I have no account to 
 give. Maj. Peter Bulkley was mentioned, page 138, as one of the persons 
 who assisted in procuring the Indian deed of Marlborough. , This was un- 
 doubtedly a son of Rev. Peter Bulkley, who was the first minister and one of 
 the first settlers of Concord, then called Mnsketaquid. Rev. Mr. Bulkley, 
 had a number of children who were much distinguished in their day. One of 
 his sons, Gershom, was married to a daughter of President Chauncey, and was 
 the father of John Bulkley, minister of Colchester, Conn. 
 
 Maj. Peter Bulkley, was in 1678-9, an agent for the Corporation of the 
 Massachusetts Bay,respecting the Narrhagansett country, (1 Hist. Col. V.221) 
 and in the first year of James II. was appointed by the King*s commission, one 
 of the Council, of which Joseph Dudley, Esq. was President. 1. Hist. V. 
 245. 
 
 It appears from the State Records, that a grant of 1000 acres of land in 
 the Nipmug or Kittituck country, was made to Maj. Bulkley, by the General 
 Court, for some service he had performed for the public. 
 
 Appendix III. 
 
 Ministers of Marlborough. — Rev. William Brimsmead, the first 
 minister of Marlborough, was a native of Dorchester, a member of 
 the class that graduated at Harvard College, in 1648, but who left 
 with several others in the preceding year, without a degree, incon- 
 sequence of dissatisfaction with the regulation then introduced of 
 requiring a residence of four years instead of three. He was em- 
 ployed as a preacher, at Marlborough, as early as 1660 ; was after- 
 wards, in 1665, after several months probation, invited to settle in 
 Plymouth, with an offer of £70 salary and firewood, which he de- 
 clined, and was ordained at Marlborough, October 3d, 1666. 
 
 John Cotton, Esq. of Plymouth, in his history of that town. 
 (1760) speaks of him as " a well acomplished servant of Christ/' 
 
 He preached the Election Sermon, 1681, on Jer. 6. 8. which 
 was printed. His salary in Marlborough was from 40 to £45 per 
 annum. 
 
 It appears from the following record that he was unable to sup- 
 ply the pulpit during the latter part of his life. "May 6, 1700. 
 Voted, to send to Cambridge for a candidate for the ministry." 
 
 "July 12. Voted unanimously, by church and town, to invite 
 Mr. Swift to help with our present pastor, if God shall raise him up.'* 
 
 At the same time a committee was chosen " to procure a place 
 to remove their minister to, and to provide him a nurse." (Mr. 
 Brimsmead had no family of his own to provide for him, having 
 never been married.) 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 61 
 
 "December 16, 1700, a committee was chosen to treat our Rev. 
 pastor, with reference to the arrears yet in his account that con- 
 cern the town, and fo bring an account of all that is behind, from 
 the beginning of the world to the end of November, 1699." 
 
 Mr. Swift having negatived the call, Mr. Joseph Morse was in- 
 vited to settle as colleague with Mr. Brimsmead. Rev. Mr. Brims- 
 mead died on Commencement morning, July 3d, 1701, and was bu- 
 ried in " the old grave yard,' 1 * where a large unlettered stone was 
 erected to his memory, which still remains, and is almost the only 
 memorial that remains of " this venerable servant of Jesus Christ."! • 
 Soon after the death of Mr. Brimsmead, Mr. John Emerson, after- 
 wards settled in Portsmouth, N". H.| was invited to be the minister 
 of Marlborough, but declined the invitation. 
 
 At length, after a long controversy respecting Mr. Emerson, 
 which was carried on with a good deal of asperity, June 1st, 1704, 
 Mr. Robert Breck, son of Capt. John Breck, of Dorchester, gradu- 
 ated at Harvard College, in 1700, received an invitation to take 
 the pastoral charge of the society, which he accepted, and was or- 
 dained, October 24th, 1704. 
 
 Rev. Mr. Breck remained pastor of the church at Marlborough 
 
 * The following inscription is placed over the remains of the first person 
 who was buried in the old burying ground in Marlborough. 
 
 ** Capt. Edward Hutchinson aged 67 years, was shot by treacherous In- 
 dians, August 2d, 1675, died, August 19th, 1675." 
 
 Capt. Edward Hutchinson was mortally wounded by the Indians, Au- 
 gust 2d, at a place called Menimimisset, about four or five miles from Quabo- 
 ag (Brookfield) to which place he had been sent with twenty horsemen by 
 the Governor and Council, for the purpose of conciliating the Nipmucks, to 
 many of whom he was personally known. It appears that they conducted 
 themselves towards him with the basest treachery. The Sachems had sig- 
 nified their readiness to treat with the English, but it must be with Capt. 
 Hutchinson himself. Having been conducted by a treacherous guide to the 
 place where two or three hundred of the Indians lay in ambush, they sud- 
 denly issued from a swamp, fell upon Capt. Hutchinson, and his unsuspecting 
 associates, shot down eight of the company, and mortally wounded three more, 
 among whom was Capt. H. himself. Capt. Hutchinson was a son of the cel- 
 ebrated Mrs. Ann Hutchinson, who occupies so conspicuous a place in the 
 early history of New England. He was also the great grandfather of Thomas 
 Hutchinson, Governor of the Massachusetts colony and the historian of Mas- 
 sachusetts. Savage's Winthrop, 1. 249. 
 
 tR,ev. Mr. Brimsmead's house stood in a lot of land on the west side of 
 Ockoocangansett hill, adjoining to said hill. Tradition says, that he uniform- 
 ly refused baptism to children who were born on the Sabbath. 
 
 ^Rev. John Emerson was first (1703) ordained as pastor of the church at 
 Newcastle, New Hampshire, dismissed in 1712, and installed pastor of the 
 South Parish in Portsmouth, March 23d, 1715, died June 21st, 1732, aged 62. 
 Mr. Emerson was a native of Ipswich and was graduated at Harvard Univer- 
 sity, in 1689. 1. Hist. Col. X. 53. 
 
62 HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 
 
 twenty seven years, and died, January 6, 1731, in the midst of his 
 days and usefulness, at the age of forty nine years, universally la- 
 mented. 
 
 A handsome monument was erected to his memory, near that 
 of his predecessor, containing the following inscription in Latin, to 
 which we subjoin, at the request of many, a translation into English. 
 
 INSCRIPTION. 
 
 Reliquiae terrestres theologi vere venerandi Roberti Breck sub 
 hoc tumulo conferuntur. Pars ccelestis ad coelum myriadum ange- 
 lorum et ad spiritus jnstorum qui perfecti sunt abiit. 
 
 Ingenii penetrantis, quoad vires naturales, vir fuit amplissimae 
 mentis et judi^ii solidi, una cum animi fortitudine singulari. Quo- 
 ad partes acquisitas spectat, in Unguis quae doc tee praesertim (audi- 
 unt ?) admodum peritus ; literarum politarum mensura parum com- 
 muni instructus ; et, quod aliis fuit difficile, ille, virtute ingenii pro- 
 prii et studiis coarctis, felicitersubegit. In omnibus Theologiae par- 
 tibus versatissimus, et vere orthodoxus, Scriba. ad regnum ccelo- 
 rum usquequaque institutus. Officio pastorali in ecclesia Marlbur- 
 iensi, ubi Spiritus Sanctus ilium constituit episcopum, per XXVII 
 annos, fideliter, sedulo, pacifice, multaque cum laude, functus est. 
 
 Doctrinae Revelatae, una cum cultu etregimine in Ecclesiis Nov- 
 Anglicanis instituto, assertor habilis et strenuus. Ad consilia danda 
 in rebus arduis, turn publicis turn privatis, integritate conspectus et 
 prudentia instructissimus. Sincere dilexit amicos, patriam, et uni- 
 versam Christi ecclesiam. 
 
 Denique pietatis, omnis virtutis socialis, et quoad res terrenas 
 moderaminis, exemplar. 
 
 In doloribus asperis aegritudinis ultimae patientia ejus opus per- 
 fectum habuit ; et, si non ovans, expectans tamen et placide disces- 
 sit. Natus Decem. is 7 mo 1682. 
 
 Denatus Januar. 6 to 1731. 
 Prophetas ipsi non in seculum vivunt. 
 
 TRANSLATION OF THE ABOVE. 
 
 Beneath this stone are deposited the mortal remains of the tru- 
 ly reverend Robert Breck. His immortal part hath ascended to 
 heaven to join the innumerable company of angels and the spirits 
 of the just made perfect. 
 
 He was by nature a man of acute intellect, capacious mind and 
 solid judgment, together with singular mental resolution. As to his 
 attainments, he was eminently skilled in the learned languages, fa- 
 miliar be} r ond the common measure with polite literature ; and^ 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHEOROUGH. 63 
 
 what to others was difficult, he by the powers of his mind, and close 
 application to study, accomplished with ease. 
 
 Thoroughly versed in every department of theology, and truly 
 orthodox in sentiment, he was a scribe in every respect instructed 
 unto the kingdom of heaven. 
 
 The duties of the pastoral office in the church at Marlborough, 
 over which the Holy Ghost had made him overseer, he discharged 
 faithfully and assiduously, in peace and with great reputation, for 
 twenty seven years. 
 
 He was a skilful and able asserter of the doctrines of revelation 
 and of the worship and discipline of the New England Churches. 
 
 He was a counsellor in cases of difficulty, both public and pri- 
 vate, of distinguished uprightness and consummate prudence. 
 
 He was a sincere lover of his friends, his country, and the whole 
 Church of Christ. 
 
 In a word, he was a model of piety, of every social virtue, and 
 of moderation in regard to earthly things. 
 
 In the severe pains of his last sickness, his patience had its per- 
 fect work; and his departure, if not in triumph, was full of hope 
 and peace. Born Dec. 7th, 1682— Died Jan. 6th, 1731. 
 
 " Even the prophets do not live forever." 
 
 Rev. Robert Breck was regarded as one of the eminent minis- 
 ters of his day. He preached the Election Sermon in 1728, from 
 Deut. v. 29, which was printed. Another of his printed sermons, 
 which is still in existence, was preached in Shrewsbury, on the 15th 
 of June, 1720, and was the first sermon preached in that town.* 
 His only other publications, so far as they have come to our knowl- 
 edge, were two excellent sermons, addressed particularly to young 
 persons, and which were preached to his people in 1 728, on occa- 
 sion of a large accession to his church of about fifty persons. The 
 former is on the danger of religious declension, from Luke ix. 61, 
 62 : the latter was preparatory to the observance of the Lord's 
 Supper, from Leviticus, x. 3. 
 
 Three funeral discourses preached at Marlborough, on occasion 
 of his death, one by Rev. John Swift of Framingham, another by 
 Rev. John Prentice, of Lancaster, and the third by Rev. Israel Lor- 
 ing of Sudbury, were published, and are now extant. 
 
 It appears, from a note to Mr. Prentice's discourse, that during 
 
 * See the history of Shrewsbury, in the May Number of this Journal, p. 
 16, by Andrew H. Ward, Esq. 
 
 I am informed by Rev. Wm. B. Sprague, of West Springfield, that he has 
 in his possession a copy of this discourse. 
 
04 HISTORY OF iNOKTHBOROUUll. 
 
 the sickness of Mr. Breck, October 15, 1730, a day of fasting 
 and prayer was kept in Marlborough for his recovery ; " several of 
 the neighboring ministers being present and assisting on that sol- 
 emn occasion." 
 
 A respectful and able notice of Rev. Robert Breck was given 
 in the Weekly Journal, No. CC. for Jan. 18, 1731, which is sub- 
 joined to the discourse of Mr, Prentice ; and another well written 
 memoir was published in the Boston Weekly News Letter, No. 
 1408, for Jan. 21, 1731, which forms an appendix to Rev. Mr. Lor- 
 ing's discourse. 
 
 " His temper was grave and thoughtful, and yet cheerful at 
 times, especially with his friends and acquaintance ; and his conver- 
 sation entertaining and agreeable. 
 
 " In his conduct, he was prudent and careful of his character, 
 both as a minister and a christian ; rather sparing of speech, and 
 more inclined to hear and learn from others. 
 
 " His house was open to strangers, and his heart to his friends ; 
 and he took great delight in entertaining such, as he might any 
 ways improve by, and treated them with good manners. 
 
 " The languishment and pains he went through before his death 
 were very great; but God enabled him to bear the affliction with 
 patience and submission. 
 
 "He was interred on the 12th with great respect and lamenta- 
 tion, and his affectionate people were at the charge of his funeral; 
 and it is hoped they will continue their kindness to the sorrowful 
 widow and orphans. "* 
 
 Rev. Robert Breck had a son of the same name, who was grad- 
 uated at Harvard University, in 1730, was ordained as minister of 
 Springfield, Jan. 26, 1736, and died April 23, 1784, in the 71st year 
 of his age.f 
 
 The father was married in Sept. 1707, to Miss Elizabeth Wain- 
 wright, of Haverhill, who died, June 8, 1736. They had six chil- 
 dren, two of whom died before their father. Of those that surviv- 
 ed him, Robert was minister of Springfield ; Sarah was married to 
 Dr. Benjamin Gott, of Marlborough ; Hannah was married to Rev. 
 Ebenezer Parkman, of Westborough ; Elizabeth, the eldest daugh- 
 ter, was married to Col. Abraham Williams, of Marlborough, and 
 
 * Rev. Mr. Breck lived on or near the same spot on which Rev. Mr. Pack- 
 ard's dwelling house was afterwards erected. 
 
 t See Rev. Wm. B. Sprague's Historical Discourse, delivered at West 
 Springfield, Dec. 2, 1824, p. 78, 80. 
 
HISTORY OF NORTHBOROUGH. 65 
 
 died two years before her father, Jan. 1729. The name of the oth- 
 er child that survived the father was Samuel, who was a surgeon 
 in the army during the French war. He married at Springfield, 
 and died, 1764. 
 
 The following account of the successors of Rev. Mr. Breck, was fur- 
 nished principally by Rev. Seth Alden, of Marlborough. 
 
 After an interval of nearly three years from the death of Mr, 
 Breck, viz. Oct. 1733, Rev. Benjamin Kent was ordained as the 
 minister of Marlborough, and on Feb. 4, 1735, was dismissed by 
 mutual consent. After his dismission, Mr. Kent brought an action 
 against the town for the recovery of his settlement, which the 
 court allowed him. The town appears to have suffered much 
 about this time from intestine divisions, which prevented the set- 
 tlement of a minister for the five years succeeding the dismission 
 of Mr. Kent. 
 
 At length, June 11, 1740, Rev. Aaron Smith received ordina- 
 tion, and was dismissed by reason of ill heath, April 29, 1778. Af- 
 ter his dismission, Mr. Smith went to reside with Rev. Mr. Bridge 
 of East Sudbury, who married his daughter, and died there. 
 
 Rev. Asa Packard, from Bridgewater, succeeded him, JJnd was 
 ordained, March 23, 1785, and April 10, 1806, was dismissed, in 
 consequence of an unhappy division in the town relating to the lo- 
 cation of a new church. This division led to an Ecclesiastical 
 Council called by the Church, which resulted, Oct. 24, 1806, that 
 in case the minority should obtain an act of incorporation as a dis- 
 tinct society, then, without breach of covenant, those members 
 of the church who should unite themselves with such Incorpora- 
 tion, might become a regular and distinct church, by the name 
 of the West Church in Marlborough. 
 
 After much opposition, such inhabitants did obtain an act of in- 
 corporation on the 23d of Feb. 1808, by the name of the second 
 parish in Marlborough ; and on the 5th of the following month, a 
 church was duly ordained. Over this church and society, Rev. 
 Asa Packard was installed, March 23, 1808, and remained their 
 Pastor till May 12, 1819, when, by mutual consent, he was regu- 
 larly dismissed. Mr. Packard now resides with his family in Lan- 
 caster. 
 
 Rev. Seth Alden, from Bridgewater, a graduate of Brown Uni- 
 versity, 1814, was ordained as the successor of Mr. Packard, Nov. 
 3, 1819, and still remains their Pastor. 
 
 Over the East Church and first parish, Rev. Sylvester F. Buck- 
 
60 HISTORY OF NORTHEOKOUGH. 
 
 lin, from Rehoboth. now Seekonk, a graduate of Brovvn University, 
 1305, their present Pastor, was ordained, Nov. 2, 1808. 
 
 Besides the two Congregational Societies above mentioned, 
 there is a society of Universalists in the town, without a stated 
 Pastor, and a small society of Methodists. The person at present 
 preaching with the former is Massena B. Ballou ; with the latter, 
 Jared Haskins. 
 
 The preceding sketches have been made up from materials col- 
 lected from various sources. The aged fathers of this and some 
 of the neighboring towns have been consulted as opportunity offer- 
 ed ; and several of the descendants of the early settlers of Marl- 
 borough, have kindly furnished many valuable papers relating to 
 the events of former days, and which have been handed down irom 
 father to son, for three or four successive generations. The writ- 
 er would particularly acknowledge his obligations to Rev. Messrs. 
 Bucklin and Alden, for the aid they have rendered him ; as also to 
 Mr. Silas Gates for the use of the copious and very valuable records 
 in his possession, inherited through his wife (daughter of the late 
 George Williams) from her grandfather Col. Abraham Williams, 
 who, for many years, was the clerk of the proprietors of the En- 
 glish Plantation of Marlborough. 
 
 The writer has also had opportunity to consult the books of 
 records of the proprietors of the Indian Plantation, now in the pos- 
 session of Mr. John Weeks. 
 
 He has aimed at accuracy ; but fears, where so much rests on 
 mere tradition, or memory not less treacherous, that many errors 
 besides those of the press, have become incorporated in the his- 
 tory. For these he craves the indulgence of his readers. 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 Page 11, end of first paragraph — The new meeting house was erected in 
 J 805, the old one taken down in 1809 : page 15, 22d line from top, for Doches- 
 ter read Dorchester ; page 25, 20th line from top, for Asa Goodenow read 
 Thomas Goodenow ; page 26, 9lh line, for Pond read Road ; page 27, 1st 
 line, for Marlborough read Northborough ; on the same page, the 2d para- 
 graph of the note should be in the place of the first, and for Simon read Sime- 
 on ; page 28, 1st line of the note, for persons read garrison ; page 39, in 4th 
 line of 2d note, for Simeon read Simon ; page 43, in 3d note, read, James and 
 John Eager were sons, and Cutler and Martyn sons-in-law of John Eager, Jr. 
 and grandsons of Capt. John Eager. 
 
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