Dighton Town (part 2 of 3)

The records of town-meetings for many years after the town was incorporated contain but little that would interest the general reader. They are mostly brief entries, poorly written and worse spelled, of the election of town officers and representatives to the General Court, varied by transcripts of bills paid by the treasurer. Some of the town offices that were annually filled then have long since been abolished. Such were the cullers of flax, clerk of the market, tithing men, and hog-reeves. What were tbe duties of clerk of the market in a farming community, such as Dighton was then, I have not been able to find out. The tithingman was required by law to be selected from the " most prudent and discreet inhabitants," and he was a sort of inspector-general of the township. He was required "to inspect all licensed or unlicensed houses where they shall have notice or have grounds to suspect that any person or persons doe spend their tyme or estates by night or day in tippling, gaming, or otherwise unprofitably, or doe sell or retayle strong drink, wine, cider, rumm, brandey, jerry, or methylin without a license." They were also required " to inspect the manners of all disorderly persons, and to present to the magistrate the names of all single persons who live from under family government, stubborn and disorderly children and servants, niglit-walkers, tipplers, and Sabbath-breakers, by night or day, and such as absent themselves from the worship of God on the Lord's dayes." The tithingman was required to be ]irovided, at the expense of the town, with "a black staff, two feet long, tipt at one end with brass about three inches." It has been handed down that these black batons were sometimes tipped at the other end with a rabbit's foot or a turkey's tail feather, wherewith to tickle the eyes or noses of the sleeping saints in the congregation, while sinners who wandered in the land of Nod during the services were smartly rapped on the head with the brass end of the staff. Such were the important duties of the tithingmen, and it is needless to say that they were regarded with a wholesome fear by evil-disposed persons.'

The duties of the hog-reeve, as might be inferred from his title, were of a very different nature. It was customary to allow hogs to run in the streets, and the hog-reeve was required to provide them with yokes around their necks to keep them out of fenced inclosures, and to put rings into their noses to prevent their rooting. The hog-reeve was paid for his services by the owner of the animals.

"In Dighton, at the Annuel Town meeting in march ye 20, anno 1733, the Inhabitanes of said Town did uannmosley vote that thare Reprasantative, Mr Edward Shove, should Exhibit a pettion to the great and genral court for so much un propriated Lands as thay in thare great Wisdom shall think fit to be for the supporting the scool in said Dighton."

There was certainly need of a liberal grant of land by the Great and General Court for the support of a "scool" in this town, if the orthography of the town clerk is to be taken as a sample of the literary qualifications of the people.

It was customary then to establish by a vote of the town the prices at which farm produce and other merchandise should be sold at. The following are some of the prices fixed by vote in 1727 : Winter wheat, six shillings and sixpence per bushel ; Indian corn, two shillings and sixpence; oats, one shilling and five pence; bayberry (this was vegetable wax, tried from the berries of the bayberry, or wax-myrtle), fourteen pence per pound ; butter, ten pence per pound; bar-iron, two pounds three shillings per hundred ; tobacco, three pence per pound. (Think of that, ye slaves of the weed, and sigh for the good old times!)

In 1728 a town-meeting was called " to consider what to do, and send such instructions to our representative, Mr. Edward Shove, as the inhabitants of the said town of Dighton shall think fit under our difficult circumstances, by reason of His Excellency the Governor, his long and vehemently insisting on a fixed and stated salary, which we humbly conceive, if it should be granted that a (iovernor sliould have a fixed or stated salary granted him in tliis province, contrary to the former custom and practice of this

1 Tli6 lust titliingmen choeen in this town were Anthony Keed, Josepli Hriggs, and Thomas Porter, who were elected at the iinunal meeting in 1834.

our General Court in granting allowances to our former worthy Governors in time past, it would greatly infringe on the privileges and freedoms granted to us by their Majesties' royal charter." The town thereupon instructed its representative to oppose this dangerous innovation and infringement of the people's rights, not .seeming to consider that the Governor had any rights in the matter of his own salary. The Edward Shove who represented the town at that time was a son of the Rev. George Shove, of Taunton. He lived on the east side of the river, and was a prominent man in town afi'airs. The Rev. George Shove was much opposed to the Quakers, and it is a little singular that most of his descendants belonged to the broad-brimmed fraternity.

It was the custom in those days for the selectmen to warn out of town any new-comers whom they thought might become a charge to the town ; their warrants to the constable to this effect frequently occur in the records. The following is a sample of one of these warrants :

" BnisTor, «.«. Dighton, Ootober the 2d. "You are in His Majesty's name forthwith required to warn tlie following pel-sous out of town as the law directs, they heing not lawful iuhal)itants of said town. The names of said persons is (as) foUoweth : The man's name is Stephen Ilnchinson, and his wife's Abigail Huchinson, and seven children, whose names are Daniel, Stephen, Richard, Joseph, Lemuel, Abigail, and Lydia, who are now in tlie bouse of Thomas .Jo8lin,as we are informed, in Dighton. Fail not, and make return of your doings to us, or one of us, quick as may he. "To Ebenezer Pool, Constable of Dighton.

" At the above said meeting (in 1734) the town vote that the selectmen should hier a scoolmaster to teach children to Reed and Wright and sifer." -

In 1751 the population had increased to such an extent that it was voted to build three school-houses, one near Mr. Jonathan Burt's house, one near Col. Richmond's, to be under the care of Josiah Talbot, Esq., and one near the house of Robert Vickery, to be under the care of Mr. George Gooding. Two of these houses were sixteen feet square, and one was twenty feet. They were probably painted red, as that was the favorite color for the district schoolhouse. At almost every town-meeting the bills for boarding the schoolmaster were voted to be paid, but only once was there mention of that functionary's name ; in 1756 one John Richmond is mentioned as the schoolmaster.

Another singular omission of the records is that no .mention is made of either of the wars between Great Britain and France, although in Ciueen Anne's war, as it is called, which lasted more than a dozen years, in the early part of tlie eighteenth century, men from this town must have served ; while in George the Second's war, towards the middle of the century, a number of men from Dighton were enlisted. The

Bristol County regiment which went with the expedition that captured the fortress of Louisburg, on Cape Breton Island, in 174r), was commanded by a Dighton man, Col. Sylvester Richmond, who was born in 1698, so that he was forty-seven years old when lie went on the expedition mentioned.' How he acquitted himself as colonel we do not know, but his military conduct might have surpassed that of his associate officers or of his commander and yet not have been worthy of special commendation. There was no lack of bravery, but there was very little judgment shown in the conduct of the siege, and not mucli discipline among the troops. Only the mutinous condition of the garrison in the fortress made its capture possible. The siege was conducted in a most unsoldier-like manner, the rear of the besieging army being a scene of disgraceful confusion, the men being chiefly engaged in the unmilitary occupation of skyhirking, running races, pitching quoits, wrestling, shooting birds, or chasing the balls shot from the fort, a bounty being paid for each one brought into camp. A wellconducted sortie from the fortress would have destroyed the undisci|ilined besiegers. On the 17th of June, however, the Dunkirk of America, as Louisburg was sometimes called, surrendered to the New England troops. " If any one circumstance," says a historian of that time, " had taken a wrong turn on our side, and if any one circumstance had not taken a wroug turn on the French side, the expedition must have miscarried."

Before undertaking the expedition Col. Pepperell, the amiable merchant who was placed in command, had consulted the celebrated preacher Whitefield, who gave his approval, and, after manner of the crusades, furnished a motto for the flag : " Nil despcrandum Christo diif-e." The grand battery was captured without bloodshed in a singular manner. The warehouses in the northeast part of the town having been set on fire in the night, a strong wind drove the dense smoke into the battery, and caused such a panic among the French that they hastily abandoned the battery and fled into the city. In the morning, as a young lieutenant named Vaughan was reconnoitering with thirteen men, he observed that there was no smoke issuing from the chimneys of the barracks, and that the flagstaff was without a flag. He thereupon bribed an Indian to climb in through an embrasure and open the gate. He thus found himself in possession of the works, and immediately sent the following report to the general in command : " May it please your Honor to be informed that, by the grace of God and the courage of thirteen men, I entered the Royal Battery about nine o'clock, and am waiting for a reinforcement and a flag." Before reinforcements could arrive the French had sent a hundred men in boats to retake the battery, but Vaughan and his baker's dozen of New Englanders gave them so warm a reception that they were prevented from landing. Europe was astonished at this victory, and in England it was sought to claim all the glory for the navy at the expense of the provincial army.

After his return from the French war, Col. Richmond took a prominent part in town affairs, and was I soon appointed high sheriff of Bristol County, holding the office for many years. His father's name was Sylvester, and he had a son and grandson of that name. His wife's name was Elizabeth, and they had eight children. He was a justice of the peace, and married many couples in this town. Marriage was considered only a civil contract in those days, and justices enjoyed almost a monopoly of tlie splicing business. There is no record of any marriages by ' Rev. Nathaniel Fisher for many j^ears after he was settled in Dighton. Col. Sylvester Richmond died in 1783, aged eighty-four years. His wife died in 1772, : at the age of seventy-two.

Col. Richmond's house and farm were on the north slope of Richmond Hill, to which his ownership gave the name. Only a part of one of the chimneys of the house is now standing to mark its site. It was a picturesque, gambrel roofed old mansion a generatiou ago, with an immense fireplace in the kitchen, where, I it was said, the colonel's slaves were wont to gather in ! cold weather. For many years it was inhabited by I two old maiden ladies, granddaughters of Col. Sylvester, who made some pretence of carrying on farming. The cart-path from the road to the rear of the house was a thoroughfare for the school children while going to and from the huckleberry pastures during the summer vacations, and they could not always resist the temptation to pocket some of the red-cheeked lady-apples and luscious sugar-pears that often strewed the path, for which iiilferings they were generallj' roundly scolded by the watchful guardians of the premises, whose names were Sally and Nancy. In return for these jobations, one of the older boys, who had a reprehensible propensity for punning, was wont to speak of the scolding Sally as " Sally-rate-us," while an admonition from her sister was termed the " Edict of Nance," an allusion, probably, to the historical Edict of Nantes. The house had the reputation in its later years of being haunted ; stories of strange sights and sounds seen and heard by some of its tenants are still current in the neighborhood. One of these stories, related to the writer by an Irishman who is known by the mbi-iquet of "Sleepy Bill," and vouched for as true by his wife, was to the following ell'ect. Let it be premised that the house stood six or seven rods from the nearly disused road that leads over the hill, and was approached by the cart-path already mentioned, whicli was closed at the road by bars. This cart-path ran along within a foot or two of the south side of the house, on the lower floor of which was the bedroom occupied by the Irishman and his wife Kate, the head of whose bed was against the south wall.

The somnolent William said that one night about one o'clock he and his " old woman" were awakened by what seemed to be a long procession of carriages that appeared to come up the cart-path from the road, and go past the house down into the swamp at the rear. Having previously heard unaccountable sounds in and about the house, they were too much frightened to get up and see what was going on, while the twenty or more carriages rumbled and jolted along over the frozen ground close to their heads. They appeared to move slowly, like carriages in a funeral procession. Another niglit they were awakened by a terrible crash in the front hall, as if the whole staircase had fiillen and been broken into fragments, but no assignable cause for the racket could be found in the morning. A boarder of theirs related that, coming home rather late one moonlight evening, he was astonished and very much frightened to see several people, dressed in the costume of long ago, dancing what he termed a " breakdown" in the front door-yard. He did not tarry to make the acquaintance of these ancient disciples of Terpsichore, but beat a retreat in doublequick time, and found a lodging elsewhere.

The uncanny reputation given to the old house by these stories and others of a similar nature, together with its dilapidated condition, made it difficult to obtain tenants who would stay in it long, and it rapidly went to ruin. While it was tenantlesa the cellar was dug over more than once in the night-time by parties acting under the direction of clairvoyants, who professed to see large sums of money buried there. Whether any pot of doubloons or of Spanish dollars ever rewarded the diggers is not known, but, judging from the ill success that has attended the long-continued search for Oapt. Kidd's buried treasure, it is probable that the search in the old Richmond cellar was unsuccessful.

In 1767 the meeting-house on the hill was destroyed by fire, the work of an incendiary. The building of a new meeting-house had been agitated for some time. The old house was found too small for the increasing congregation, but there was a division of opinion as to the proper location for the new one. Some thought the old place the best situation that could be found ; others preferred Buck Plain, as that would be nearer to their own homes, while a few were in iiivor of enlarging the old house. One dark night there was a blaze upon Meeting-House Hill, and the question of repairing and enlarging the primitive structure that stood on its summit was decided beyond reconsideration in the negative. After the fire the dispute about the site for the new house still continued to agitate the community, and there being no prospect of agreement, it was found necessary to call in referees from another town to settle the vexed question. The names of five men were drawn from the juror-box in Attleborough, and the referees thus called upon, after a careful hearing of all parties in the dispute, decided to stick up a stake on Buck Plain as the spot where.

in their opinion, the new house should be built. The place chosen was about a mile westerly from where the first house stood. There were but few houses in the immediate vicinity. Nature has not been lavish in her gifts to that level portion of the town known as Buck Plain. The land is not remarkable for fertility, and the plain is chiefly covered with a low growth of scrub-oaks, and such was undoubtedly the case in the early settlement of the locality.

The origin of the name is said to have been as follows: In former times there were three distinct families bearing the name of Briggs in the town, and to distinguish them they were called respectively the " Stout Briggses," the " Buckhorns," and the " Whippoorwills." What was the signification of the latter appellation is not, perhaps, known at the present day. Possibly some members of the family lived in the woods, and were nocturnal in their ways. The " Buckhorns" w'ere so called from certain curious protuberances like budding deers' horns that appeared on the heads of many of that branch of the name, even down to a late period. The "Stout Briggses" were distinguished for great bodily strength, the word stout being here used in its original sense of strong, and not in the later sense of corpulent as Washington Irving used it in his sketch of the " Stout Gentleman." According to the story which has been handed down, one Samuel Briggs, of the Buckhorn branch, lived not far from the locality that is now called Buck Plain ; how long ago the tradition does not state, but it was some time, probably, in the first half of the last century. Samuel was crossing the plain one day when he came upon a large buck lying under a rock among the scrub-oaks fast asleep. Being an active young man he determined, as he had no gun to shoot the animal with, to attempt to capture it alive. He therefore crept cautiously up to the sleeping deer, and sprang upon' its back, seizing one of its horns in each hand. The astonished and frightened buck leaped to its feet, and made off at a headlong pace in the direction of the river, which was more than a mile distant, Briggs clinging to his back as best he could. On they tore through bushes, briers, and scrub-oaks, and reaching the river at last, the panic-stricken animal plunged in with its rider, who managed to drown and capture it. According to the tale, when Briggs reached the river he was very nearly in purls naturalibus, all of his clothing having been torn of!" excepting his shirt collar and wristbands. Mazeppa's famous bareback ride was a tame affair compared to Samuel Briggs' ride on the buck. Although the Cossack hetman's condition as to clothing was much the same throughout his involuntary ride as Briggs' condition was at the end of his, yet, unlike the latter, his clothes were not torn from him piecemeal by cruel thorns, nor was he in danger of falling off, being securely tied to his horse's back. While Mazeppa's ride has been the theme of poets like Lord Byron, of novelists like Bulgarin, and of bold, and that of Hopkins tremulous and uncertain, from the palsy that afflicted him. "I was determined," Ellery used to say in after-years, " to see how they all looked as they signed what might be their death warrant. I placed myself beside the secretary, Charles Thomson, and eyed each closely as he affixed his name to the document. Undaunted resolution was displayed in every countenance."

Commodore Talbot. - Commodore Sil.is Talbot was a native of this town. He distinguished himself in the Revolutionary war on both the ocean and the land. His parents were Benjamin and Zipporah Talbot. The house they lived in, and in which Silas, the ninth of their fourteen children, was born, has long since been torn down. It stood in the lots, with only a cart-path as a way of approach, between the road leading from the Lower Four Corners to Pitts' Corner and Hunter's Hill, and southerly of the house now owned by Isaac Pierce. Benjamin and Zipporah were buried in the family cemetery near by, with several of their children. Tliey were poor, hard-working people, unable to do much in the way of education for their children, and Silas was early in his boyhood placed on board a vessel as cabin-boy, perhaps as good a school as he could have had for the work he had to do in after-life. He was born Jan. 21, 1751. When he was twelve years old his father died, and as liis mother had other children younger and weaker than he to support, he was necessarily thrown upon his own resources for the future. He learned the stone-mason's trade, then considered a very lucrative one, and removed to Providence, R. I. In 1822 he married a young lady named Richmond, and went to housekeeping in Providence, then a small town. He engaged occasionally in mercantile speculations, " iu which," says H. T. Tuckerman, who wrote his biography, " he exhibited more than ordinary boldness and sagacity. An instance is related of his sailing down the river when lumber had unexpectedly risen to a high price, intercepting a vessel thus loaded, purchasing the cargo, and making sales in town at an enormous advance."

When the Revolutionary war broke out Talbot and a number of other young men hired an old Scotch drum-major who had deserted from the British army to drill them in military tactics in the loft of a sugarhouse. In June, 1775, he was commissioned as a captain in one of the three newly-raised Rhode Island regiments, and went to Boston with the regiment to take part in tlie siege of that town. He next went with the army to New York, at which port was a fleet of British men-of-war. Here he was placed, at his own request, in command of a fire-ship, in which he sailed up the Hudson River some fifteen miles, anchoring a short distance above Fort Washington. Soon after he had cast anchor three of the enemy's war vessels sailed up the river and anchored a few miles below where he lay. A night attack was immediately resolved upon. " At two o'clock in the morning," says the biographer, " they weighed anchor and dropped slowly down with the tide. The nearest of the ships was the 'Asia,' of sixty-four guns, whose tall spars and towering hull no sooner loomed upon the gaze of Talbot's hardy band than they steered directly for her broadside. Unsuspicious of any danger, it was but a moment before her little adversary had flung her grappling-irons that the 'Asia' fired, and then a scene ensued that baffles description. ... In an instant the darkness of a cloudy night gave place to a red, flashing glare that revealed the fort, the waters, and the fields with the distinctness of noonday, and brought into vivid relief the huge vessels of war, now alive with their startled crews, who hastened to the relief of the ' Asia,' some pouring water on the rising flames, others disengaging the fire-ship from her side."

The attack was unsuccessful, at least in destroying any of the enemy's ships, but it served the purpose of driving them from their position into the lower bay, and it likewise had an encouraging eflect on the American cause. Congress passed a vote of thanks to Capt. Talbot, and he was at once promoted to the rank of major. He had remained too long on the fire-ship, being the last to escape, and he was severely burned. It was some weeks before he recovered from his injuries.

We next hear of Maj. Talbot in the defense of Mud Island, iu the Delaware River, and here he displayed his accustomed daring. His arm was broken by a musket-ball, and he received a wound in the thigh. He returned home to recover from his wounds, and as soon as his condition permitted joined the Conti nental army under Gen. Sullivan's command, on the mainland of Rhode Island, where he rendered essential service in superintending the building of eightysix flat-bottomed boats, intended to carry one hundred men each, for the transportation of, the army to the island. These boats were calked by candle-light, and Talbot, wearied by his unceasing ettbrts to forward the work, was accustomed to sleep under the boats, while the din of the calking-mallets was ringing over his head. An incident of the campaign will illustrate the cool daring of this born leader of men. The crossing from the mainland was commenced on Sunday, the 9th of August, and the light corps, to which Maj. Talbot was attached, marched down the road towards Newport until within a cannon-shot of the enemy's lines. Talbot was then sent forward alone by Col. Laurens, who was in command of the corps, to reconnoitre. He had neared the enemy's outposts, when he saw three British artillerymen in a garden, foraging for vegetables. Without hesitating an instant he jumped his horse over the wall and " threatened them with immediate death if they stirred. Thinking that he was one of their own officers, they made some apology for being absent from their posts, and gave up their hangers. He then drove them before liim to the American lines as prisoners of war.

Count d'Estaing's departure with the French fleet to Boston rendered tlie retreat of the American army from the island a necessity, and in the retreat and the fight which preceded it Maj. Talbot's aid was very efficient, and was commended in the dispatches of the commanding officer to Congress. His next exploit was the capture of one of the enemy's armed vessels. The British, in order to close the east passage, had anchored a vessel of some two hundred tons in the passage, off a point of land called Fogland. This vessel had formerly been in the naval service, but had been cut down to one deck, and was armed with twelve eight-pounders and ten swivels. She had a crew of forty-five men, and her deck was protected from boarding-parties by strong netting. She was named the " Pigot," and was commanded by a lieutenant named Duulap. This armed galley effectually prevented any American vessels from passing up or down Seconnet River, to the great annoyance of the people of Rhode Island and Southern Massachusetts.

Maj. Talbot resolved to capture or destroy the " Pigot," but his project was for some time coldly re- 'ceived by Gen. Sullivan, who deemed it impracticable, but at length consented to furnish a draft of men for the purpose. The major immediately selected a sloop in Providence named the " Hawk," and armed her with two three-pounders and sixty men. Before he could get at the " Pigot" he would have to pass one of the enemy's forts at Bristol Ferry and another at Fogland's Ferry, in Seconnet River, and both forts were safely passed in the night.

After reaching the upper end of the island, the " Hawk" drifted silently down the Seconnet River, with a kedge lashed to the jib-boom to tear the nettings of the enemy. The Fogland fort was passed without alarming the sentinel, although he could be seen pacing back and forth before the barrack lights. Fearing that he should miss the object of his search in the darkness, the major cast anchor just below the fort, and sent a boat forward with muffled oars to reconnoitre. The men in the boat reported the " Pigot's" situation, and the anchor was again hove up, while the strong ebb tide swept the " Hawk" down upon her prey. They were soon hailed by the watch on the deck of the " Pigot," but making no answer a volley of musketry was fired at them, but before the " Pigot's" guns could be brought to bear the kedge on the " Hawk's" jib-boom had torn away the netting and was caught iu the shrouds, while her crew leaped on the " Pigot's" deck and drove every man below excepting her commander, who fought gallantly in his night-clothes, but was soon captured. Not a man was killed on either side. The prize was carried into Stonington. For this daring exploit Maj. Talbot again received the thanks of Congress, and was promoted to be a lieutenant-colonel in the army, while the Assembly of Rhode Island presented him with a sword. The next year he was made a captain in the navy, although there was no man-ofwar for him to command. He was, however, authorized to arm a naval force to protect the coast from the cruisers of the enemy. Lack of money and lack of vessels made the task a difficult one, but the captured "Pigot" and a clumsy sloep called the " Argo" were finally equipped and manned, the" Argo" being the flag-ship. Her armament consisted of twelve small guns and her crew of sixty men.

In May, 1779, Capt. Talbot sailed from Providence, and soon captured the " Lively," of twelve guns, and two privateer brigs from the West Indies. The prizes were carried into Boston amid great rejoicing. Talbot then cruised about in search of a Tory privateer named the " King George." She was commanded by a Capt. Hazard, a Rhode Islander. She carried fourteen guns and eighty men. One fine day, when about forty leagues from Long Island, the " King George" was seen, and the " Argo" bore down upon her, giving her a broadside when near enough, and then ranging alongside, Talbot and his men leaped on board, and the " King George" was surrendered without the loss of a man on either vessel.

Not long afterwards the " Argo" fell in with a large armed ship, and a desperate fight, lasting four hours, took place, the vessels being all the time within pistol-shot of each other. Nearly every man on the quarter-deck of the "Argo" was killed or wounded. Capt. Talbot had the skirts of his coat shot ofl", and his speaking-trumpet was pierced in two places by bullets. At length the mainmast of the ship fell and she surrendered.

After this fight the owners of the " Argo" reclaimed her. Capt. Talbot then took command of a privateer called the " George Washington." But now his good fortune deserted him. He fell in with a fleet of British men-of-war, two of which gave chase and captured the "Washington" before night. Her commander and crew were carried to New York, and thrust into the hold of the Jersey prison-ship,' The horrors which they endured while in captivity were almost too much for their endurance, nor was their condition improved when they were transferred to another hulk called the "Yarmouth," in which a deadly fever soon broke out. Only Talbot's strong constitution and iron will enabled him to survive through the dreadful imprisonment. He was finally carried to England, and exchanged for a British officer. When he arrived home he had been absent two years. Not long afterwards he married his second wife, a Miss Morris, of Philadelphia, and buying the forfeited estate of Sir William Johnson, in New York State, he removed there with his family and engaged in farming. In 1793-94 he was again before the public, now as a

1 Capt. James Briggs, of Uiis town, Wiis also for a time immured iu that floating hell, the Jersey prison-ship, as was also Rev. Thomas Aiidros, of Berkley, who wrote au account of his impiisoument.

member of Congress, and he was soon appointed to the command of one of the six ships that Congress had decided to add to our little navy. When hostilities commenced with France in 1799, he was placed in command of the frigate "Constitution," and was on the West Indian station.' In 1801 he resigned his command, thinking himself unjustly treated by the Secretary of the Navy, who had given precedence to Commodore Truxton. His decision was evidently unjust, as Commodore Talbot was the senior officer, and had performed greater services for the country than Truxton. But republics are proverbially ungrateful. The remainder of his life was passed in New York City, where he built a handsome house, and where he married his third wife.

" In person," says his biographer, " Capt. Talbot was tall and graceful, in features determined but attractive. A portrait of him, painted by Benjamin West, is in possession of his descendants in Kentucky. . . . He was an accomplished gentleman, with a dignity of manners that stamped him for a leader, and yet with a frank urbanity of spirit that endeared him as a companion. He was thirteen times wounded, and carried five bullets in his body. In private life, the elegant hospitality he exercised, the ardor of his personal attachments, the winning grace and self-respect of his manners, his acquaintance with life in all its phases, and a certain generous nobility of feeling rendered him in his prime one of the best specimens of a self-made American officer the country has produced. He died in the city of New York on the 30th of June, 1813, and was buried under Trinity Church. No monument has been erected to his memory, but his gallant deeds are inscribed on the immortal records of the war of independence, and his name is enrolled among the patriot heroes of America."

Such is the picture that has been handed down to us of Commodore Silas Talbot. Brought up in poverty, with little of the education to be derived from schools, and cast upon his own resources at an early age, he showed himself equal to any station to which his energy, sagacity, and bravery caused him to be promoted; he possessed in no small degree "that strong divinity of soul that conquers chance and fate."

HoDijAH Baylies. - Although not born in Dighton, Maj. Hodijah Baylies, aide-de-camp to Gen. Washington, was a citizen of this town for many years. IMaj. Baylies was born in Uxbridge, Mass., Sept. 15, 1756. His father's name was Nicholas, and his mother before her marriage was Elizabeth Parks. His ancestors were Quakers, and resided in ihe parish of Alvechurch, county of Worcester, England. His grandfather, who was named Thomas, came over from England with his son Nicholas and a daughter named Esther in June, 1737. He returned to Eugland the next year, but came back under a contract with one Richard Clarke, of Boston, as a clerk in an ironworks, bringing his wife and two daughters with him. Another son, Thomas, came over later, and for some years kept a store in Taunton, and was interested in the manufacture of iron. Nicholas, Maj. Baylies' father, settled in Uxbridge, but after the death of his brother Thomas, Jr., which occurred in 1756, he moved to Taunton, and was a large land-owner and manufacturer of iron in that place.

Hodijah Baylies was the youngest of eight children. Two of his brothers, William and Thomas S., were residents of Dighton, and were prominent men in the town. They will be more particularly mentioned hereafter. Hodijah graduated at Harvard College in 1777, and almost immediately entered the army as a lieutenant, his first service being on the Hudson River. When Gen. Lincoln was appointed to the command of the Southern Department, Lieut. Baylies was selected by him as one of his aids. In the campaigns that followed he took part iu much hard fighting at Savannah, Charleston, and elsew'here, acquitting himself creditably in whatever situation he was placed. He was in the city of Charleston during the memorable siege by the British, and when Lincoln finally surrendered to Clinton on the 12th of May, 1780, he was included among the prisoners of war. He rejoined the army as soon as his exchange was effected ; was present at the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, and having been selected by Washington as one of his aids, remained in this position until the end of the war. He stayed for some time with Washington at Mount Vernon after peace was concluded, receiving a brevet as major in the army. He returned to the North in 1784, and married Elizabeth Lincoln, daughter of Gen. Lincoln, who resided in Hingham, in this State. After residing for a time in Hingham he removed to Taunton, and engaged in business as a manufacturer of iron, the works being at Westville. The anchors for the frigate "Constitution" were made at the Baylies Forge.

As soon as the Constitution of the United States had been ratified in 1789, Maj. Baylies was appointed collector of customs at Dighton, and at once removed to this town with his family. His father had died in Taunton two years before, iu his ninetieth year. Maj. Baylies held the office of collector of customs until 1809.^ In 1810 he was appointed judge of probate for the county of Bristol by Governor Gore, holding the office until 1834, when, at the age of seventy-eight, but in the full vigor of Ids mental faculties, he res The following are the names of the collectors who held the office after Maj. Baylies ; Nathaniel Williams, from 1809 until his death in 1S23; Hercules Cushman, frum 18a3 to lf>25; Seth Williams, Esq., son of Natlianiel, from 1825 to 1829; Dr. William Wood, from 1829 to 183.!; and Horatio Pratt, from 1833 to 1834. In the latter year Dr. P. W. Lelaud was appointed, and the office was removed to Fall River. While Dighton was the port of entry the custom-house was not, aa at present, in a building costing half a million of dollars, but the books were kept at the residences of the collectors.

signed. During his later years he was known as Judge Baylies, his military title being seldom used in connection with his name. He owned a fine farm in Dighton, of some two hundred acres in extent, including the woodland, some of which was heavily timbered.' The house that he bought was a tavern during the Revolution, and was remodeled and enlarged by him. He had four children, - -William G. (who lived in Boston, and died in 1848), Edmund, Amelia, and Benjamin L. Edmund was born in 1787, at Hingham, engaged in commerce in Boston early in life, and made several voyages to Russia, acquiring a handsome fortune. He married a Miss Eliza Payson, and bought a residence in Taunton, not far from the Neck-of-Land Bridge.' Amelia married Dr. Alfred Wood, formerly of this town, but now residing in Taunton. Benjamin L. never married ; he lived at the homestead until his death, a few years since. Judge Baylies died April 26, 1843, in tlie eightyseventh year of his age. His wife had died twenty years before, at the age of sixty-three. She is said to have had an excellent judgment and a kind heart, gifts that were inherited by her daughter Amelia.

Maj. Baylies was said to have been one of the handsomest men in the army. His deportment, while showing his military training, was yet easy and graceful, and his manners were polished and engaging. While he was in the army, Robert Treat Paine, the jurist and statesman, who knew him well.

1 A large tract of this woodland was termed tlie Pine Swamp, and is still known by that name, although the timber was cut oft' a few years ago. It was probably the only laige tract of the primeval foi-est in the town, and was an interesting: spot to visit. The trees were of various sorts, chestnut, hemlock, and pine predominating. The swamp is evidently tile bed of a filled-up lake. In some places a fifteen-feet pole can be thrust down without reacliing hard pan. On the south side is a steep liill or ridge of gravel that was formerly covered wilh large chestnut- and hemlock-trees, under which there was always a twilight gloom even at midday. This ridge of giavel is probably a terminal nn)ialne, piled up by the action of ice in the glacial period. Another smaller bit of the primeval woods is found on the Baylies farm, near the river, and is now called Simmons' Grove, from Mi-. V. N. Simmons, the present owner of the farm. This grove is noted for the clam-bakes that are annually held there by the Methodist and Baptist Societies. The trees are chiclly white-oaks, and the grove gives one a good idea on a small scale of the appearance of the forest at the time wlieu Winslow and Hopkins made their journey from Plymouth to Pokanoket, and found the trees " stjindiug not thiike hut a man may well ride a horse among tliem."

It was on the northerly slope of the steel) Pino Swamp Hill, however, that the solemn grandeur of the i>rimeval forest impressed itself most strongly on tiie lover of nature. As in the land of tlie Lotus-Eaters, it seemed there to be always in the afternoon, and on dark cloudy days to be very late in the afternoon, "'(wixt the gloaming and the murk." It vva^ in srjme such bit of wild woodland scenery, no donbt, that Longfellow wrote these lines, -

"This is the forest primeval : the murmuring pines and the hemlocks. Bearded with moss and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight Stand, like Druids of ohl. with voices sad and prophetic. Stand like harpei's boai', with beards that rest on their bosoms."

'- Edmund Baylies bad three children, - Elizabeth, Euth, and Edmund Lincoln. The latter, who was commonly called Lincoln Baylies, was born in 1829. He married Nathalie E. Kay, of New York. In 1869 he went to Europe, being much out of health. Tlie chango did not prove as beneficial as was ho|n-d, luid lie died at Geneva. Switzeiland, Nov. 28, 1869. He possessed in a marked degree the good sense and probity characteristic of most of the Baylies family. He left four children.

said to his mother, " Your son, madame, has all the elegance of the British officers, without any of their vices." The vigor of his mental faculties was sustained to the last. " His perceptions," says a writer in an obituary notice in a New Bedford paper, " were clear and acute. His conversation, marked by strong sense, abounding with anecdotes and interesting reminiscences of the Revolution, exhibited, almost to the last days of his life, the liveliness of youth, without any of the garrulity of age, always tasteful, animated, and correct."

Judge Baylies' father. Deacon Nicholas, was a man of more than ordinary intelligence and force of character, of excellent judgment, and of sterling integrity, respected by all who knew him. It was remarkable that in those days of dram-drinking he was a practical teetotaler, not tasting of ardent spirits, it is said, for more than sixty years. He left eight children, sixty-five grandchildren, and thirty-five greatgrandchildren.

De. William Baylie.s. - William Baylies, brother of Hodijah, wiis born in Uxbridge, Nov. 24, 1743, and graduated at Harvard in 1760. He was a man of fine mental endowments, and held many positions requiring high intelligence and a sound judgment. He was a member of the Provincial Congress which convened in 1775. During the Revolution he was often in the councils of the State. In 1784, while in the State Senate, he was appointed by Governor Hancock register of probate for Bristol County and a judge of the Court of Common Pleas. He was a member of the State Convention which ratified the Constitution, and in 1800 was an elector of President and Vice-President. He also represented his district in Congre.ss for four years. He was an original member of the medical, historical, agricultural, and humane societies of this State, and was an early member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was, besides, a skillful physician, and practiced medicine in Dighton for many years. He died in 1826. His son, Hon. William Baylies, LL.D., statesman and lawyer, was born in Dighton, Sept. 15, 1776. He practiced law for many years in West Bridgewater, and there the poet, William Cullen Bryant, studied law under his tuition. He died in Taunton, Sept. 27, 1865, and was buried in the old cemetery on the hill in Dighton. On the reverse of this monument is the following eulogium, far more deserved than are many of the flattering words of praise to be found on tombstones :

"This stone commemorates the virtues of one pure alike in public and in private life, and honored and beloved in both. .\n upright statesman, a persuasive lawyer, a prudent and faithful counselor, sincere in word and purpose, calm and kind in tempei-, eipiitable in judgment, wise in action, who never lent his great talents to the aid of injustice, and abhorred the gain that is acquired in making the worse appear the better cause. He lived a long, useful, and spotless life, and left a noble example to the generation which comes after him."

William Baylies, and his fatlier, the doctor, before him, owned the farm now belonging to the heirs of the late Silas P. Briggs. The house was formerly

Mason & Co., importers and commission merchants, at No. 43 Broadway. lu this business Cupt. Pendleton cuntinuert to the day of his death. He leaves a widow anii three daughters.

"It was while in command of the 'Lucy Thompson,' in 1S53, that public attention was first called toOapt. Pendleton hy his rescue of some of the passengers of tlie ill-fated 'San Francisco,' and especially by his manner of extending his aid. The 'San Francisco' was a uew steamship, owned by Mr. Aspinwall, and built especially for the California trade. She was of two tlumsand five hundred tons burthen, and was regarded as one of tlie finest eteaniLTs tliat ever sailed from this port. She started on hor first voyage from New York Dec. 21, 1853, having on board about six hundred souls, including officers and crew. Among the passengers were eight companies of the Thirtieth Kcgiment United States Artillery, comprising about five hundred men, bound for California, under command of Col. William Gates, and a number of ladies and children composing the families of the officers of the rf-ginienl. The 'San Francisco' sailed with fine weather and good prospects for an excellent voyage, but on December 27th, when only three days out of port, a terrific gale was encountered, and the new steamsliip proved to be totally unmanngeablo in the heavy seas. On the first day of tho storm her masts went by the board, and one hundred men were swept overboard and lost by one powerful sea. For five days she labored in the rolling waves, threatening at every moment to founder, and each day a number of unfortunates were swept into the sea and drowned. To add to the liorrors of the situation the sailors began to drink heavily, plundering the stores of the purser, and all discipline was at an end on the steamship. The cholera also broke out on the dismantled vessel, and scores were prostrated by this scourge, so that there seemed to be onlj' one choict' for all, - death bydrowningor destruction by thefell disease. On December 29th, however, the bark 'Kilbey,' Capt. Lowe, was spoken, and she took off upward of a hundred of the passengers. Two days later the 'Three Bells,' Capt. Creighton, who died a short time ago, rescued another lot, and on Jun. 2, 1854, the 'Antarctic,' Capt. Stouff'er, took the remninderof the passengers from the sinkingship, which soon aftersank beneath the waves,

"The ' Kilbey,' when she took tho passengers from the ' San Francisco,' was herself in distress. She had been out forty-eight days, was short of provisions, and had only one cask of water to serve out to her own crew and the strangers. Capt. Murray, however, thought it probnble that he would meet some vessel soon which would relieve him of his charge, and he refused to leave the men to die on the 'San Francisco.' For fifteen days the ' Kilbey' sped along, meeting no ship and encountering heavy gales, which split her sails and almost dismantled her, while her provisions had been reduced to such a low ebb that for nearly ten days a handful of parched corn was all that could be allowed to each porstju on board. Hope of deliveiance had well-nigh fled, wlien, on January 13th, the 'Lucy Thompson, ' Capt. Pendleton, was sighted, and, in answer to the signal of distress shown by the ' Kilbey,' lay to, although a terrific gale was blowing and the sea run dangerously high. Capt. Pendleton sent a boat to the * Kilbey,' ami on ascertaining the condition of things on board the vessel offered to take on the ' Lucy Thompson' one hundred of tlie passengers of the ' San Francisco.' and to furnish provisions to the 'Kilbey.' It was a matter of great difticulty and danger to transfer the passengers with the heavy sea running, but the work was safely done, and till- two Vessels proceeded on their way, the 'Kilbey' to Boston, and the ' Lucy Thompson' to this port. Col. Gates, as soon as heboarded tlie 'Lucy Thompson,' sent his quartermaster to Capt. Pendleton to assure him that lie shuuld be paid well for his rescue of the United States ofticeis and soldiers. To this the captain replied that he had done only his duty, and he could not think of taking money for saving human life. Capt. Pendleton ct>ntinued to hold this noble view of his duty to the day of his death, refusing to put in any claim for payment against the government, although he was frequently urged to do so by his friends, and alth"Ugh liis otliceis and men all filed claims nnd were duly paid for their .-services. The 'Lucy Thompson' arrived hero with the rescued passengers Jan. 15.1854, and Capt. Pendleton, with the other captains of the vessels who had taken the people from the 'San Francisco,' were the heroes of the hour. The merchants of this city contributed over six thousand dollars for a testimonial to be given to the captains, and at a public dinner Capt. Pendleton was jiresented with a handsome service of plate, valued at two thousand dollars. This was inscribed, 'Presented by the merchants and citizens of New York to Capt. C. B. Pendleton, of the ship " Lucy Thompson," as a testimonial of the appreciation of hia humane and gnllant efforts in assisting to save the passengers and crew of the steamship " San Francisco" after the terrific gale of the ^4th December, 1853.' The citizens of Boston also sent to Capt. Pendleton a handsome silver pitcliei", and from Phila'lelphia came u purse of two hundred and fifty dollars. This money he invested in a picture descriptive uf the rescue of the passengers, painted by Walteis, the Liverpool artist. In after-years the house of Capt. Pendleton was often the scene of reunious of the rescued passengers of the ' San Francisco.' "

Town Clerks Of Dighton Representatives To The General Court From

In the preparation of these pages the sources from which information has been obtained have been so various, and the individuals to whom the writer is under obligations so numerous, that only a few of them can be mentioned here, and he can only extend to the great majority, collectively, his sincere thanks. Among those not already mentioned to whom he is indebted are Hon. Henry Williams, of Taunton ; Gen. E. W. Pierce, of Freetown; C. A. Reed, Esq., of Taunton ; and H. W. Hart and G. E. Gooding, Esqs., of North Dighton. Mr. W. R. Taylor, of Bristol, R. I. ; Rev. L.Kinney (historical sketch of Baptist Church); and also the pastors and clerks of several of the religious societies for the loan of records.

Biographical Sketches Weston Earle

WESTON EARLE. Ralph Earle emigrated from England jjrobably between the years 1633 and 1638. There is a tradition presumed from the directness of its descent to be authentic that he came from Exeter. Of this, however,

From the records of the Colonial Court it appears that Ralph Earle, with nineteen other residents of Portsmouth, R. I., petitioned the king, under date of April 30, 1638, for " permission to form themselves into a body politic." Upon the records of the town of Portsmouth, R. I., under date of first of eighth month, O.S. (October) 1638, there is " A Catalogue of such (persons) who by the Genral! consent of the company were admitted to the Inhabytants of the Island now called Aqueedneck, having submitted themselves to the Government that is, or shall be, established according to the word of God therein." This catalogue contains fifty-nine names, of which that of Ralph Earle is one. Again, under date of " April ye 30th 1639," his name, with twenty-eight others, is appended to the following declaration of allegittiice : " We whose names are under | written doe acknowledge'! ourselves the legell subjects of [his majestie] King Charles, and in his name [doe hereby bindej ourzelves into a civil body politicke unto his lawes according to matters of justice."

At a town-meeting, June 2, 1649, Ralph was " chosen treasurer for this next year ensuing, and also overseer for the poor," and at another town-meeting, April 29, 1650, he, with five others, was chosen " for the committee for the General Assembly at Newport in May next." At a town-meeting in 1647 he had been " chosen to keep an Inn, to sell beer and wine, and to entertain strangers," but at a similar meeting, Nov. 12, 1650, with a species of hair-splitting worthy of the metaphysicians, it was " voated and granted that Ralph Erl's house wherein he now dwelleth be recorded an Inn, in ye room of ye former vote that lie was an Innkeeper." It would appear that he was an inn-keeper by compulsion rather than choice. Jan. 16, 1651, he was " chosen to oversee the work of the Prison," etc. May 5, 16-55, with two others, he was chosen as juryman " for the Generall Court of tryals to be held in Providence." In 1667, he joined a " troope of horse," which had been ordered to be raised, and on the 10th of August signed, with eighteen others, a paper approving "the choyce of our captaine and Lieflenant to the full." It appears that Ralph was afterwards captain of this troop. April 28, 1669, he was placed on the Grand Jury ; and June 7, 1671, he and eleven others of Portsmouth, R. I., and several residents of Newport, were appointed by the General Assembly of the colony as a Special Court, to sit on the 15th of the same month, to try " two Indians now imprisoned upon criminall charge."

Several deeds of real estate from Ralph to other persons are upon the records of Portsmouth. In the "New England Genealogical and Antiquarian Register," vol. vi. p. 369, it is stated that Ralph claimed the lands of the Dutch " House of Good Hope," now Hartford, Conn., and commenced a lawsuit therefor against Richard Lord and James Richards, of Hartford, possessors of the Dutch land about 1667. Earle affirmed that he purchased the land of Underhill in August, 1653, and paid him twenty pounds sterling for it, but Underhill protested against Earle's claim. "It is not improbable," continues the writer in the "Register," "that there was some foundation for this claim." There are many papers on the subject in the archives of Connecticut. We have no record of the date of Ralph's decease, but his " Will was Entered and Recorded the 14th day of the 11th month (O.S.), 1677, as Atest John Anthony, Town Clarke," of Portsmouth.

Thomas Earle, of Portsmouth, was received a freeman of the colony in 1764. No other record- of his name has been found. He was probably a son of Ralph, and died not long after the year just mentioned.

Ra/p/i^ Earle married lone ; settled in Portsmouth, R. I., in 1638. His children were Ralph, Wlliam', Mary, Martha, and S.irah. William'' died in 1715. His children were William, Ralph, Thomas^, John, and Prudence. Thonias" lived in Warwick, R. I. He died in 1727. His children were William, Thomas, Mary, 0/irer', Sarah, Lydia, and Rebecca. Oliver* married Rebecca Shernian, and lived in Swansea, Mass. He died in 1766. His children were Joshua, Caleb', Thomas, and Mary. Caleb' was born in 1729, and died in 1.812. He lived in Swansea, Mass. He was twice married, first to Sarah Buffinton, in 1745. They had sis children, - Elizabeth, Weston'^, Caleb, Benjamin, Josiiua, and David. His second wife was Hannah Chase. They were married in 1769. Their children were Mary, Jonathan, Rebecca, Daniel, Sarah, Oliver, and William. Wesfon^ was born in Swansea in 1750, and died Sept. 5, 1838. He married three times, first Hepsibeth Terry. Their children were Caleb, Sarah, Hepsibeth. His second wife was Sarah Slade. (See Slade biography, in Somerset.) Their children were Johji\ Slade, Edward S. His third wife was Martha Smith. They had one son, Thomas G. Jo//«' was born May 24, 1790. At the age of sixteen he began teaching, and continued in tliis employment during the winter months for thirty-seven years. In addition to the common school studies he taught navigation and the higher branches. He was also a successful farmer, was for several years a member of the General Court, and for two years occupied a seat in the State Senate. He held many responsible positions in the town, where his value was recognized, was a justice of the peace, and was often called upon to administer estates. He died in the seventy-fifth year of his age. He married Roby, daughter of Asa

Their children were Westoit'*; Sarah, born in 1811, married Phili]) Simmons in 1835; John M., born in 1819; Elizabeth M., born in 1822, married, in 1857, F. A. Boomer, of Fall River, Mass. (See biography in history of Fall River.)

Weston'^ Earle was born Feb. 19, 1810, in Swansea, where he continued to reside, working on his father's farm until he was twenty-one. He then went to Rochester for three years, when he returned to Swansea, where he worked on a farm until he was twentyeight. In 1837 he purchased his present farm, where he has lived since 1838. He is a firm supporter of the Republican party. He was for many years one of the selectmen of Dighton. He is a descendant in the eighth generation from Ralph Earle, who came from England, and was one of the first purchasers and settlers of the island of Rhode Island (in 1638). His wife's name was lone, and the subject of this sketch has a grandson and granddaughter named after the original Ralph and lone Earle.

Mr. Earle married Content (daughter of Benjamin Slade and Elizabeth Robinson), born Feb. 8, 1798, at Swansea. She was the youngest of eight children, who all lived to an advanced age.

Charles H. Gooding

Charles H. Gooding was born in Dighton, Mass., Feb. 5, 1812. He is the fifth generation of the Goodings who have resided on the ancestral farm settled by George Gooding in 1684. He had emigrated from Somersetshire, England, and purchased the place before King Philip's war. George Gooding had four children, three daughters and one son, viz. : Matthew, the great-grandfather of the subject of this sketch. His grandfather and father both bore the name of Joseph, the latter born in 1772. His mother was Betsey Austin, daughter of Seth Austin, Sr., of Dighton, and he is the youngest of a family of six children, of whom he and his sister Betsey, widow of the late Samuel L. Thaxter, are the only survivors.

Mr. Gooding was well educated in the branches taught at the common schools of his native town, and received additional advantages at a grammar school in Fall River, where his father resided and carried on the clock- and watch-making business and a general jeweler's store. Charles learned of his father the trade of a clock- and watch-maker, though he did not continue to follow that pursuit. He served as deputy postmaster at Fall River about one year, and in 1834 went to the city of New York, and was about ten years engaged there as a book-keeper for his brother, Albert Gooding, who was a merchant in the Spanish West India trade. In 1844 he settled on the homestead in Digliton. Under the administration of Presidents Taylor and Fillmore he was inspector of customs at Dighton, a branch of the Fall River office being then kept at that place. He has carried on the homestead farm since his return there in 1844.

Mr. Gooding was married, Feb. 5, 18.57, to Mary Almy, daughter of Capt. Abraham Briggs, of Digliton, and widow of Mr. Gilbert L. Talbot. She was a native of Providence, R. I. They had no children. She died Sept. 24, 1880, aged sixty-six years and two months.

A Whig and a Republican in politics, he is yet an Independent, and believes more in principles and men than in party. In religious faith and worship his affiliations are with the Unitarian Church, and he is a supporter of the church of this order in Dighton.

We append to this brief sketch the following article, recently published in the Taunton Gazette, respecting the occupation pursued by several members of this family :

" The Goodixg Family of Clockmaicees. - A recent notice of the death of a member of the Gooding family, the last of the brothers, natives of Dighton, suggested the grouping of a brief genealogical reminiscence relative to the histor\', mechanical skill, and occupation of this family of clock and watchmakers. Probably no similar instance can be cited in this country where so many of one family followed that ingenious business, to whom may be added nearly a dozen descendants pursuing the same occu])ations, nearly all citizens of this State.

" The old homestead where they were born stands upon the estate of their late pilgrim ancestor, George Gooding,- who died Jan. 1, 1712, in his eightieth year. His son Matthew inherited the estate ; Joseph was the third, Joseph (2d) the fourth, in lineal descent, and the eldest of the five brothers, and three sisters - Rebecca (Mrs. Reed), Deborah (Mrs. Standish), and Elizabeth (Mrs. Perry) - comprised the family of the fourth generation.

" Joseph (4th) was born in 1772, and at an early age developed a remarkable mechanical genius and a peculiar aptitude for clock and watch machinery. When about sixteen years of age his father sent him as an apprentice to an English Quaker, an ingenious watch and clockmaker in Hanover, where he remained a few years, until he was as expert as his master in the business. He returned to Dighton, and commenced the manufacture of brass clocks before he was twentyone years of age, in a little room in the old homestead. He afterwards, in 1797, built a store near the Upper Four Corners, and enlarged the business, with

1 Joanna, a diiughter of George Gooding (3d), married John Godfrey, Esq,, and was tlie motherof Biig.-Gen. Godfrey, men of note during the last century in this county.

two of his brothers as apprentices, in making the tall, mahogany-cased clocks, after the English style, recently imported from London at great expen'^e. These clocks, besides the time-dial, noted the day of the month and the moon's phases, some of which may be found in old family residences at the present day. All the delicate brass-work was executed by his own hands and those of his brother apprentices. Not a cog-wheel or pinion was turned out by machinery, as done by the million at present. None of those grand mahogany-cased time-keepers are now made, yet many are still keeping note of the time and the phases of the moon as correctly as they did nearly a century ago. Those who hold them in possession as family heirlooms are loth to part with their venerable Gooding clocks for an)' consideration, which have proved such reliant time-keepers. At the manufacture of these famous clocks the younger brothers, as they left the humble school and patrimonial farm, served apprenticeship with their senior brother, .Joseph.

"In 1826, Joseph removed his business to Troy (now Fall River), then having a population of less than three thousand, and followed watchmaking, at which he was an adept; also a designer, engraver, and die-cutter, and skillful at all. After remaining a dozen years he returned to his homestead in Dighton in 1838, and resumed the repairing of clocks and watches until his death, in 1853, at the age of eighty and they had two daughters and four sons. The two eldest, Joseph and Albert, followed their father's business, and went to Bogota, South America. William also removed there in the shell-comb manufacture. Albert and William died some years ago, and Joseph died recently. Charles H., who cultivated the ancient family estate of nearly two centuries, also repairs clocks for diversion, continuing the family occupation.

"Josiah, the second brother, after finishing his trade, settled in Bristol, R. I., and followed the clock and watch business until his death, in 1864, at the age of eighty-eight years. He left four sons, two of whom, James and Josiah, continued the same business. One remains in the father's store.

"John, the third brother, went into business in Plymouth, remaining there until his death, some eight years ago, at the age of ninety, leaving three sons. Benjamin succeeded his father, and James is one of the prominent memljers of the Waltham Watch Manufactory, and aided in building up that enterprising establishment to its present vast j)roporlions and wide reputation.

" Alanson, after leaving his apprenticeship, settled in New Bedford, and followed the business until 1840, when he retired. He made a trip to Europe several years ago. He died Nov. 18, 1877.

menced the clock and watch business in Diixbury, where he married and remained a few years. He subsequently removed to Boston, and continued the favorite business in Dock Square, Washington and State Streets, until age caused him to retire about a dozen years ago. He died on the 10th of December at the age of ninety-two years and six months, leaving five daughters and a son, but none to continue the business of the father.

"The live brothers averaged over half a century in devotion to that business, and they sustained the remarkable aggregate age of nearly four hundred and forty years. Their sister, Mrs. John Reed (mother of Henry Gooding Reed, of Taunton), died in January, 1872, at the venerable age of ninety, making the aggregate of the five brothers and sister over five hundred and thirty years. All lived remarkably temperate and even-tenored lives, worthy representatives of their sturdy pilgrim ancestry and lineage, as well as their successors and descendants, who follow them in the ingenious line of occupation. It is a rare record of a family, hence it may be of readable interest to the relatives, friends, and others who may not have heard of the Gooding clock and watchmakers."

Alfred W. Paul

Alfred W. Paul is of Scotch descent, and is lineally connected with one of the oldest families in Taunton. Two brothers, Richard and William Paul, came to this country from Scotland at an early day, the former on board of the ship " Castle" in 1636-37. He was born in 1615, and Nov. 7, 1638, married Margary Turner, of Taunton, Mass. The same year he took an inventory of the estate of John Bryant, of Taunton. He was licensed to keep a victualing-house Aug. 3, 1640 ; was subject to militarj' duty 1643 ; was on a jury of inquest September, 1650, and again July 23, 1653 ; June 7, 1652, he was surveyor of highways, and died at the age of about "thirty-nine in 1654, his "widow" being mentioned in the will of Elizabeth Pool, dated March 17th of that year.

That William was not a son but a younger brother of Richard is evident from the fact that he " was born in Scotland in 1624." The lineage of the subject of this sketch is traceable directly back to this ancestor, William. He was a weaver by trade, and married Mary, daughter of John Richmond, of Taunton. He sold a dwelling-house to his sons, John and Edward, Feb. 27, 1687; gave five acres of laud towards the payment of Rev. Mr. Danforth, the Taunton minister, Feb. 27, 1688; was a large land-owner in tlie "Taunton South Purchase," containing the present town of Dighton, which was bought of the Indian "King Philip" in 1672 by a company in Taunton, of which William Paul was a member. In two different divisions of the purchase he received lots Nos. 3, 28, 45, and 85, the last division having been made March 18, 1683-84. The dates of the deaths of William and i James Paul, the eldest son of William and Mary, was born April 7, 1657; it is not known into what family he married, but his wife's name was Mary. He was one of the twenty-six proprietors of the South i March 25, 1715. He died before Jan. 14, 1724-25, aged about sixty-seven years. James Paul, of the third generation, also married a wife Mary, and h.ad a son William (fourth generation), born date unknown. This William married Mary (family unknown), died about 1735 ; their son James (fifth generation) was born in Dighton, date unknown. He married Sarah White, and moved thence to Putney, Vt., about 1795, where he died. John, the second son of James, above mentioned, was in the Revolutionary war, and was one of the party of twelve men who captured the British commander. Gen. Prescott, within the British lines in Rhode Island, 'while John was serving in the command of Gen. Barton. He was the first man picked by Gen. Barton for the dangerous service, and was selected to throttle and secure the British sentinel on guard at night, which he did. Subsequently to the Revolution he removed to Vermont, where he died.

Peter White Paul, son of James, of the fifth generation, was thegrandfather of our subject, Alfred W. Paul. He first married Silence Briggs, who died M.ay 7, 1795, and he subsequently married a second wife, whose name was Hannah. He lived in Dighton; his death was caused by a fall from a load of wood Jan. 15, 1814. He left children by each wife; among the former was Peter Paul, father of our subject, born March 20, 1787. He married DiUy Phillips, who died Sept. 14, 1819, and he afterwards married Eunice Edson. He died Oct. 27, 1851. The children by the first wife were Peter W. and Nancy; by the second wife Alfred W., Elisha K. (of Diglitou), Lucy F. (twins), and Eunice.

Alfred W. Paul was born in Dighton, Mass., Aug. 5, 1822. He was brought up on the ancestral farm and educated at the common schools, evincing in early life an aptitude for study, which, notwithstanding a lack of opportunity for classical instruction, has enabled him to acquire large knowledge on general subjects and to become exceptionally well informed on the special subject to which his life has been chiefly devoted, viz., that of agriculture, embracing also horticultural studies and pursuits. A portion of his early life was devoted to teaching in the common schools, for which he was in part prepared by one term spent at the State Normal School at Bridgewater, Mass., in 1844.

On Nov. 26, 1846, he was united in marriage to Deborah Palmer Briggs, daughter of Silas P. Brigg.s, of Dighton. Her ancestors were among the early settlers in this portion of New England. The fruit

Mr. Paul is a self-made man, and in every respect the architect of his own fortune, having by his own unaided exertions made his way from poverty to comparative competence. His honor and integrity as a man have also been preserved unsullied through his struggles for worldly success, and he has attained a high place in the respect and esteem of his fellowcitizens. One instance may be mentioned illustrative of his energy and self-reliance. When he purchased the farm where he now resides in 1847 he had not a dollar in his possession, and bought the place wholly upon credit. Of course he did not fail to meet his obligations, and it is mentioned as a fact that he succeeded in entirely paying for the place in about eight years, besides carrying on the expenses of living and other interests.

He has given special attention to farming and gardening, illustrating on his own land the kind of tillage and crops which yield the largest percentage of profit per acre. He is a member of the Bristol County Agricultural Society, and of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society; has been active in the meetings of these societies, and has written some articles on the subject of agriculture, notably " My Farming Experience," an address delivered before the county meeting of the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture in December, 1878. This article was published in the Annual Report of the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture for 1878-79. It attracted considerable attention, and he received letters on the subject from many portions of the United States.

Mr. Paul has been a Republican in bis political principles since the inception of that party, and voted for its first Presidential candidate, John C. Fremont, in 1856. His standing in relation to political questions has never been equivocal or doubtful, for he has decided opinions. He has served many years as justice of the peace, and as probate judge has settled many estates to the general satisfaction of those interested, and has held several ofiices in his town.

While managing his home land in a manner to secure the largest returns for the acres cultivated in 1882 he purchased four farms, with buildings and improvements thereon, in New Hampshire, which he still owns.

Thom.As D. Standish

THOM.AS D. STANDISH. Thomas D. Standish, whose portrait appears on another jiage, is a lineal descendant in the seventh generation from Capt. Miles Standish, who came over in the " Mayflower." The latter belonged to a family of some consequence in England, who had been long established, with landed possessions, in Duxbury, a town of the parish of Standish, in Lancashire, where he was born. The family settled in Duxbury, now in Plymouth County, Mass. Alexander, Miles, Josiah, Charles, and Lora Standish were children of Capt. Miles Standish, by his wife, Barbara.

Alexander, of Duxbury, eldest son of Capt. Miles Standish, married Sarah, daughter of John Alden. They had sons, Miles, Ebenezer, and David, and daughters, Lora, Lydia, Sarah, and Elizabeth. Alexander, by his .second wife, had Thomas, born 1687, Desire, born 1689, and Ichabod.

Josiah, of Duxbury, brother of Alexander, married Mary Dingly, Dec. 19, 1654. They had children. Miles, Josiah, Samuel, Israel, Mary, and Lois.

It is probable that Thomas D. Standish is descended from Alexander, of Duxbury, as the names in that branch would indicate, although the records are not sufficient to establish the fact.

David, one of the sons of Alexander, was of the third generation from the original Miles Standish. The line of descent was probably through Comfort, Lemuel, and David, the father of our subject. From an imperfect record torn from an old family Bible once in the possession of David Standish, it appears that his grandfather, Comfort, died Jan. 4, 1795, aged seventy years. This would make his birth to have occurred in 1725. He married Rachel Magoon. The record of their children is as follows :

Tlie grandfather of our subject was the Lemuel Standish above mentioned. His wife's name was Hannah, and her death is recorded as having occurred Aug. 2.3, 1803, aged seventy-four years. David, son of Lemuel and Hannah Standish, was born in Hanover, Mass. His children were :

Thomas D. Standish was born on the homestead adjoining his present residence, in Dighton, Mass., his father, David, having removed there from Hanover and est.ablished a ship-yard, which he carried on for a number of years. He married Deborah, daughter of Joseph Gooding, who was born and reared on the old Gooding homestead near by. They had nine children, one of whom died in infancy. Thomas was next to the youngest child. He received a commonschool education, and worked on the farm and in the ship-yard during his minority, part of the time in New Bedford. He has been a man of unusual energy and perseverance, having acquired by his own exertions all that he possesses. His father becoming insolvent through losses when he was quite young, he managed to purchase the homestead and kept it in the family, paying for portions of it from time to time, as he could earn the means by working at ship-building.

Dec. 17, 1843, he was united in marriage to Cynthia Briggs, daughter of George Briggs, of Dighton. Her mother's maiden name was Cynthia Jones. Mrs. Standish was born Nov. 12, 1821. They have had four children, one son and three daughters, of whom James C. and Delia T. are living, the former married and living on the adjoining homestead farm, the latter living with her parents.

Source changes here: from A History of Bristol County, Massachusetts (Vol. 2), by Hutt, Frank Wolcott, published 1924; 6,773 words in this source stream.

Dighton Town

Dighton, busy and progressive river town, named for Frances Dighton, wife of Richard Williams, one of the first purchasers of Taunton, has always been a place of industries, whether of agriculture and garden-making, or ship-building or cotton-manufacturing and its allied interests. The first comers remembered the Four Corners neighborhood - then running in various directions and of several hundreds of acres - as an extensive garden that had been planted by the natives. In later years the white settlers had their gardens throughout that section; a part of the "Old Field," as it was called, within our times has been made use of as the Dighton Nursery, by Dr. Alfred Wood; and still more recently on portions of that same Old Field, the Azoreans and Western Islanders who have immigrated in numbers and purchased many of the old homesteads hereabouts have made thrifty use of much of the land with their own orchards and gardens. Dighton thus agriculturally, at least, is particularly interesting in its transitions from one race to another in succession.

In Early Days. - George Shove, Esq., historian, has made interesting reference to a fact that previous to the permanent settlement of this territory, transient settlers, hunters and small farmers, built their homes along the edge of the old Indian farmland of which mention has been made. Who these were, there remains no further record, but it is understood that all had left before the outbreak of the King Philip War in 1675, with the exception of Captain Jared Talbot, who, when the war actually made itself evident, went over to Taunton to join the colonists at the garrison house. The name of Jared Talbot is the first to appear in the old records of this Purchase. When the white settlers began to buy land of the natives, this was called the Taunton South Purchase, and it was conveyed to the purchasers in two sections and on two different occasions. A committee of the First Purchasers, consisting of William Brenton, Esq., William Harvey, James Walker, Richard Williams, Walter Deane, George Macy and John Richmond, received the deed of the first section September 28, 1672, paying therefor £143, the property being three miles wide along the river, and four miles in length. These men transferred the deed, with the exception of their own rights, to Rev. George Shove, third minister of Taunton, and seventy-six associates. The deed of the second part of the purchase was dated October 1 the same year, and it was transferred to Constant Southworth, treasurer of the Plymouth Colony who paid for it £47, transferring the deed to the committee mentioned. This section was one mile wide on the river and four miles long. Soon after this transaction, a Two-Mile Purchase, so-called, was sold to Swansea. Permanent settlement began to be made in the Purchase soon after the King Philip War, but the earliest family record that has been preserved concerning the section is that which announces the marriage of Jared Talbot and Rebecca Hathaway, May 4, 1687. It is believed that theirs was the first frame house in Dighton. And prior to 1712, the year of the incorporation of the town, the names of the South Purchase dwellers mentioned are those of David Walker, Edward Shove, Ebenezer Pitts, Samuel Talbot, Nathan Walker, John Burt and Abraham Hathaway. The town of Dighton was incorporated May 30, 1712.

At about the time of the town's incorporation, the residents of the present Berkley and Dighton joined their holdings on the river by a ferry, which was situated about a half mile below the present Berkley and Dighton bridge. [In 1715 Captain Jared Talbot and Deacon Abraham Hathaway were given charge of the use of the ferry-boat, which was to be free for the inhabitants on all public days. Another ferry was afterwards established a mile farther down the river. The town officers at the time of the incorporation in 1712 were: Joseph Deane, town clerk; selectmen; Colonel Ebenezer Pitts, Edward Paull, James Tisdale; constables: John Burt and David Walker; assessors: Samuel Waldron, Daniel Axtel and Abraham Shaw; town treasurer, Ensign John Crane; tithingmen: Isaac Hathaway and John Wood; surveyors: Abraham Hathaway and

During the 1812 War the north part of this town seceded from the south part, the former becoming incorporated June 8, 1814, as the town of Wellington. It is stated by various writers that the cause of the separation had to do both with the ministry and meetinghouses, as well as with politics and disappointed politicians. But after about a dozen years of separation the town was reunited to Dighton, February 22, 1826. Dighton was made a port of entry in 1789, and the house still standing on Pleasant street was used as the Custom House to 1834, when the headquarters was removed to Fall River. The following were the collectors of customs: Hodijah Baylies, 1789-1809; Nathaniel Williams, 1809-23; Hercules Cushman, 1823-25; Seth Williams, 1825-29; Dr. William Wood, 1829-33; Dr. P. W. Leland 1834. Dwight F. Lane has been town clerk and treasurer since 1897. Howard C. Briggs is town auditor.

Schools and Churches. - The first record that relates to the proposed support of a school in the town is dated 1733, when at town meeting of March 20, Edward Shove was appointed to present a petition to the General Court relating thereto. The next year it was voted to hire a schoolmaster to teach children to read, write and cipher. In 1751 three schoolhouses were built, two of them sixteen feet square and one twenty feet square, one located near Jonathan Burt's house, one near Colonel Richmond's, another near Robert Vickery's. And then, in 1755, the first schoolmaster, John Richmond, is referred to. There were these school buildings in the town in 1923, namely: the North Grammar building, North Primary building, South Grammar building, Brick school, Broad Cove school, Fish school, Flat Rock school, Segreganset school, Williams school, with a total of 538 pupils. The appropriation for the maintenance of the schools, as made in 1923 was $38,000. Pupils attending high school in Taunton, forty; in Fall River, ten. School superintendents since 1912 have been: John C. Davis, 1912; Mortimer H. Bowman, 1912-21; Walter K. Putney, 1921-23; Norman T. Bond, 1923. The school board in 1923: Chairman, Roy F. Walker; financial secretary, Frank B. Place; corresponding secretary, Samuel C. Hamilton; Ralph Earle, Henry W. Horton, Trevor F. Goodell.

Four years before Dighton was incorporated as a town, the First Congregational Society was established in 1708, and Rev. Nathaniel Fisher was chosen the minister, his pastorate starting in 1710, and extending through two-thirds of the century to 1777, in which year he died at the age of ninety-one years. Mr. Fisher was a graduate of Harvard College, and his one pastorate was at Dighton, he being ordained here. His church, the first to be erected in Dighton, was at the town cemetery, near the residence of Hon. Charles S. Chase, and was built in 1708. The structure was burned in 1767, the fire being of incendiary origin. Soon afterwards a meetinghouse was built on Buck plain, fifty-five feet long by forty-five feet wide, the sum of £500 being appropriated therefor. The Brick Church, so-called, was built in 1826, and it was dedicated May 1, 1827. Rev. John Smith who had been assisting Mr. Fisher; became minister of the church in 1777, and he remained until 1800. He was a graduate of Princeton College. One of his grandsons was Professor W. B. Smith, of Union Theo- logical Seminary. Rev. William Warren, a Dartmouth College graduate, was his successor, his ordination taking place in 1802. He was dismissed in 1815, and up to 1826, when Rev. William Torrey preached here for a year, there was no regular pastor. The ministers in succession since then have been: Revs. Preston Cummings, Jonathan King, John Shaw, Joseph Bailey, Malachi Ballard, E. R. Claggitt, William Walker, George Brown, E. Newhall, Ezra Newton, Enoch Sanford, Horace Pratt, Ebenezer Dawes, Edson J. Moore, William B. Green, Nathan T. Dyer, Calvin T. Keyser, Frank E. Mills, Granville Yager, Dorrall Lee, F. J. Noyes, Robert Humphrey, John P. Richardson, William F. Warren, Hollis A. Campbell.

The organization of the Second Congregational Society was brought to pass in this way: the residents of the east and south sections of the town were dissatisfied with the location of the new church on Buck Plain, and they withdrew and built a church of their own on Elm street, on the location of the present building of the Unitarian church. This house was raised and boarded, but its finishing was postponed with the coming of the Revolutionary War, and thus, without windows or doors, the structure was for some time used as a sheep-pen by Captain Rufus Whitmarsh, owner of the farm adjoining. The work of completion of the edifice was put off until 1797, and that year two tracts of woodland were given for a ministerial fund for the Pedo-Baptist Congregational Society, as the church was then called, the donors being Colonel Sylvester Richmond and Joseph Atwood. With the proceeds of the sale of the timber, the church was completed in 1798. _

Rev. John Smith, who was pastor of the First Church, assisted in the establishment of the Second Church by preaching there on alternate Sundays, so continuing until 1800. The first settled minister for the new church was Rev. Abraham Gushee, who came in June, 1803. Ordained September 23, that year, he remained with this church for more than a half century; and when the division took place between the Orthodox and the Unitarians, Mr. Gushee joined the latter. He died October 5, 1861, at the age of eighty-six years, and he was succeeded by Rev. Francis LeBaron, who remained with the society one year. The ministry of this church since that time has been as follows: Revs. Fiske Burrill, J. L. Hatch, George Kelso, F. E. Kittredge, John Wills, William Reeby, Obed Eldredge, Alfred Cross, Mr. Hodges, Miss Leggett, A. J. Rich, Stephen Palmer. The meetinghouse was re-modeled in 1861, at an expense of nearly $2,000. Memorial Hall was built in 1889, and presented to this society by the children of Alfred Smith, of Newport, as a memorial to their mother; and the house standing on the same lot with the hall was presented to the society, for a parsonage. Bequests by a daughter of Mrs. Smith and by Cyrus Talbot, bring the total of invested funds held by the society to nearly $75,000.

The Baptist Church was organized in the west part of Dighton in 1772, as the result of a religious revival. Elder Enoch Goff was chosen the first pastor, and in 1781 David Simmons was ordained as his colleague. The meetinghouse, near the site of the Rehoboth line, was completed in 1780, and it was dedicated on the "dark day,' May 19, 1780. A larger house was built in 1796, a mile to the north of the old one, and although it is not now in possession of the original owners, it has ever since been known as the Elder Goff meetinghouse. Elder Ephraim Sawyer was called to the pastorate in 1806, who preached until 1810, in which year Elder Goff died. From 1807 to 1813, 262 members were added to this church. Rev. Silas Hall succeeded Elder Sawyer for a year, and from 1813 to 1840 the following-named were the pastors: Revs. Bartlett Pease, Mr. Lovejoy, Caleb Green, John Reed, J. L. Whitmore. In 1845 this church built a meetinghouse at the Four Corners, at a cost of $1,600, and from that time onwards, the following-named have been the pastors: Revs. John B. Parris, Caleb Blood, Charles F. Colver, Alexander Carr, Samuel Carr, James Andern, Edwin Stillman, S. A. Thomas, L. Kinney, Mr. Latham, Mr. Horton, J. C. Boomer, A. W. Carr, Albert N. Dary, R. G. Johnson, William D. Athearn, Fred A. Robinson, O. H. Wallace, Robert Bennett, Walter Bartlett, E. F. Chandler, Thomas G. Denchfield.

The Christian Church of West Dighton is the outcome of a division that was made with the Baptists in 1840, with Rev. Otis W. Bates as the pastor. The pulpit is occasionally occupied by ministers and students.

As early as 1814, attention was first called to Methodism in Dighton, when Israel Anthony, a mill overseer, secured preachers to hold meetings in the village. The first Methodist class was formed here in 1816, with Rev. Orville Hinds as the leader; there were twenty-six members in this class. In 1830, Rev. John D. Baldwin was first regularly appointed to the pastorate, the church being dedicated July 13, 1831, by Rev. Lewis B. Bates. North Dighton was made an independent charge in 1837, with Rev. John Bayley as pastor, and ten years afterwards, in 1847, the parsonage was built. The present church edifice was completed in 1866, and dedicated October 14, that year. Following is the list of pastors: Revs. John Bayley, David Culver, Ephraim Capen, Bryan Morse, George H. Winchester, Charles A. Carter, Edward A. Lyon, Abel Gardner, Richard Donkersley, William Cone, Franklin Gavitt, W. H. Richardson, Asa N. Bodfish, Lawton Cady, Carlos Banning, Nathaniel Bemis, O. N. Brooks, Henry H. Smith, John N. Collier, L. B. Bates, Erastus Beaton, Asa N. Bodfish, T. Snowden Thomas, W. H. Stetson, Edwin F. Jones, George W. Ballou, George H. Bates, J. W. Malcolm, George W. Wright, George H. Lamson, George H. Bates, Frank §S. Parkin, C. F. Brightman, W. E. Kugler, C. H. Ewer, George A. Sisson, H. H. Critchlow, John S. Bridgford, Mortimer Braley, J. B. Aldrich, A. S. Muirhead, A. W. C. Anderson, W. E. Plaxton, Norman McKay, Edwin J. Reese, John McVay. A new church was built in 1900, and dedicated May 14, 1902.

The Second M. E. Church was formally organized May 13, 1866. In 1893 the old church was sold, and the purchaser removed it. The present structure was erected in its place, and it was dedicated December 14, 1893. The pastors: Revs. James A. Dean, H. H. Smith, A. E. Hall, V. W. Maltoon, Dennison Brown, John Lindsey, L. F. Causey, S. E. Evans, F. D. Sargent, Thomas Simms, C. A. Littlefield, John Thompson, Silas Sprowl, John H. Buckey, William D. Wilkinson, C. F. Hatch, Robert Clark, Charles B. Allen, E. S. Collier, Jerome Greer, Charles A. Purdy, E. W. Goodier, John Pierce, O. B. oMrris, James Biram, C. J. Oleson, John L. Cole, L. D. Spaugy, W. E. Handy.

A Universalist society was formed in South Dighton about the year 1840, the church being built on Main street where the Methodist church now stands. After awhile this society went out of existence, its ministers . having been Revs. Hewitt, Hodston, Chamberlain and Arnold. Their chapel when it was sold, was converted into an academy, known as Dighton Academy, which building was sold in 1866 to the Methodist people.

The first services of St. Joseph's Catholic Church were held on Easter Sunday in 1887, as a mission of Sacred Heart Church at Weir Village. Rey. Father McDonough purchased a schoolhouse and converted it into a church for the use of the Catholic people of North Dighton. St. Peter's Catholic Church was established in 1902 as a mission of the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes, at Weir Village. The church was founded here by Rev. Father Smith for the benefit of the Portuguese population in this town.

St. Paul's Episcopal Church was organized at Pilgrim Hall, in this town, March 8, 1914, the first services being held on Easter Day that year. The building formerly occupied by the Christian Church of North Dighton and built by that society in 1831, was secured for the Episcopal church and consecrated as St. Paul's Church. Rev. Walter E. Tourtellot has had charge of the services there the past four years.

The Dighton Union Band that began to hold meetings as early as 1773, brought about the organization of the Christian Union Church of North Dighton in 1831. The society retained its corporate existence many _ 'years.

In the Wars. - The townsmen elected to carry into execution the resolves of the Continental Congress in 1775 were Sylvester Richmond (3rd), Rufus Whitmarsh, Peter Pitts, Joseph Gooding, Dr. William Baylies, Abiezer Phillips, George Codding, David Walker, Samuel Phillips, William Gooding, James Dean, John Richmond, John Simmons, Town meetings were held every few weeks for the enlisting of soldiers and raising money for the war. On March 1, 1781, the town issued an emancipation proclamation so far as the negroes serving in the army were concerned, when seven black men were declared freemen because of their service in the army.

In the Civil War there were ninety-five men who served in the army from Dighton, and nine in the navy - a total of 104. There were 172 in the World War from this town.

Industries. - The following history of the Mount Hope Finishing Company and its great plant, also contains much of value along other lines in local history. It is written by one who is prominent in the industrial world in this section, and who has spent years in gathering the materials for the article which appears herewith.