Quincy City (part 4 of 12)

way. Acknowledgments, transfers of land, and permits to take stone and timber from the commons were entered of record in the town book; and yet a dozen pages of it were not filled in as many years. The machinery of government was organized slowly, Nothing was done that did not have to be done. But at last, in March, 1673, when the town was already a third of a century old, it was voted that thenceforth on the first Tuesday of March and the last Tuesday of October there should be general meetings of " the whole inhabitants" to make choice of their town officers and to agree upon all things that might concern the common welfare. Even then, for twenty nor were the names of the town officers entered in the book. matter of common knowledge, and they met at each other's houses. This continued to be the case until after the Revolution of 1688, during which Braintree heartily sympathized in the movement which overthrew Andros. It was in 1693 that the list of town officers first appears, and from this time forward the machinery of town government was com- The officers chosen were five selectmen, a town clerk and a commissioner, two constables, five The next year surveyors of highways and field-viewers were sweping the meeting-hous in the year 1694, and eight shilings for mending the pound, seven shilings to William Savill for dimblebe's cofin, and eight shilings to constables for warning the Town, and five shilings for the exchang of a Town cow to Samuel Speer, and ten shilings to Thomas Bas for dept for ringing the bell formerly, this to be raised by rate." tensions of Boston land claimants; then the division front. The village theatre of 1700 was in fact exactly like the national theatre of 1850, excepting only that it was not so large. As the tariff and bank issues in the latter were succeeded by the disunion issue, so in the former the question of title was The title question has already been sufficiently referred to, but a few words more may be given to the division a suitable and reasonable line of division, distinction, or limitation. . . . That said line be lovingly agreed upon and settled (if it may be)." Edmund Quincy was chosen moderator, and then ensued an angry and exciting debate, for the record reads that " after the warrants were read there were some immediately that did declare against the dividing of the town, and that they did refuse to Joyne with said Inhabitants in that affair, and requested that it might be entered The names were then recorded ; and it is a significant fact that effected, and this absorbing issue was disposed of. Town government was now thoroughly organized in Braintree; and, for purpose of illustration, the record of a single year will not be uninstructive. Take, for instance, that of 1710-11. During those twelve months, from March to March, three townmeetings were held, one in March, one in May, and one in November. At the March meeting town officers were chosen, and a special committee was appointed " to go and search the records at Boston with reference to the grant of the six thousand acres of land by the General Court to the town of Braintree." Twenty shillings were also voted to Joseph Bass as a suitable compensation for two years' service as town At the May meeting the delegate to the General Court was chosen, and also a sealer of leather.

and shall be complied with on either side that may be for the peace and satisfaction of both parts of the town." It was a committee of representative men, for like ring. Upon it were a lieutenant-colonel, two captains, one cornet, two sergeants, besides " Lieut. Deacon Savel." One only bore no military designation, plain '" John Ruggles, senior." This was in March, 1708.

Apparently the committee did not '" discourse" in vain, or perhaps the Rev. Mr. Fiske proved a successful peacemaker ; for steps were soon taken towards effecting a peaceful division. By December matters had been so far advanced that a special town-meeting was called, as the warrant ran, "then and there to ordered to defray the town charges for the current year. Provision was then made for the increase of the town herds, and an appropriation of six pounds The schoolmaster, ' Mr. Adams," was then " impowered to demand a Load of wood of this impost it will be noticed that girls were ex- Edmund Quincy served upon it, and it went on an | errand of peace; but, as registered, it has now a war- |

Precinct freeholders that Mr. William Rawson should have "liberty to build a Pew for himselfe and Family where the three short seats of the women's be, and so to joyn home to the foreseat of the women's in the old Meeting-house at the southwest end." To this same Mr. Rawson, it may be added, there had ten years before been conceded " the privilege of making a seat for his family between or upon the two beams over the pulpit, not darkening the pulpit." those usual to periods of peace. be said that Braintree could not have escaped its share of the burdens of that severest New England trial when, and when only in its whole history, the The long struggle So

Braintree was one of the more fortunate towns. Though a few wretched Indians lingered within its limits down even to the middle of the next century, the great plague of 1616 had within Braintree limits done its work thoroughly. Rum and smallpox finished the little it had left.

Twenty years later came King Philip's war, and Braintree is said now to have received a scratch from An insignificant Indian raid occurred, and four persons were killed, - *' three men the wildcat's claw. and a woman. 'The woman they carried about six or seven miles, and then killed her and hung her up in an unseemly and barbarous manner by the wayside In consequence of the alarm occasioned by this raid a sort of frontier post was established on the Bridgewater road, and Richard Thayer, who had been '" impressed" as one of the Braintree contingent, was put in charge of it. claimant of Braintree lands under an alleged Indian

This individual has already been mentioned as a grant. It has also been stated that as a military commander Richard Thayer seems to have been in- three horses, with saddles and bridles, 'to be at Boston by seven o'clock in the morning, the 18th of this 6th month," to accompany Gen. Gibbons ; and it was Mr. Tompson, of the Braintree church, who was selected " to sound the silver trumpet along with his army.' Among the commissary stores of this expedition, - * Bread, tenn thousand; beif, six hogsheads; fish, tenn kintalls," ete., - '' strong water, one hogshead ; wine at your pleasure; beere, one tunn." These preparations proved too much for the savages. They succumbed before a blow was struck.

Again in 1653, the commissioners of the confederacy of New England colonies "conceived themselves called by God to make a present war against Ninigret, the Niantic sachem," and the next year it fell to Massachusetts to raise one hundred and eightythree soldiers, foot and horse, to go forth in that under the fences, and not able for any action, being But his participation in this last exploit was by others denied. Nevertheless he afterwards brought in that bill for services and disbursements at this time, amounting to thirteen pounds, men for active duty, seven of them mounted. These figures now have an inconsiderable sound, and convey but a slight idea of the stress of war. Yet a call for nineteen men was to Braintree of 1675, with its eighty families, as heavy a draft as a call for 325 men from Quincy in the Rebellion of two centuries later. The largest number who went out from the town in any one year of that Rebellion was 304 in 1861.

In 1690 came the French war, and Braintree was called upon to furnish thirteen men for the ill-fated Quebec expedition under Sir William Phipps. The The town records tell it in a way not to be improved upon :

"The 9th of August there went soldiers to Canada, in the year 1690, and the smallpox was abord, and they died six of it; four thrown overboard at Cape Ann, Corporal John Parmenter, Isaak Thayer, Ephraim Copeland and Ebenezer Owen, they ; and Samuel Bas and John Cheny was thrown overboard at Nantaskett."

Two more of the thirteen, making eight in all, died shortly after reaching home. Yet, according to the Rev. Cotton Mather, "during the absence of the forces the wheels of prayer in New England had been continually going round." From the beginning this expedition had not been popular in Braintree. The young men had refused to be impressed, and Col. Edmund Quincy, on whom had fallen the duty of supplying the contingent called for, had been forced to write toold Governor Bradstreet, then the head of the provisional government, that there were among those impressed in Braintree '"' but two or three who will go. I can dono more, without there be some sent for, and made example to the rest. To behold such aspirit is of an awful consideration." tree church had been effected there was little for the town to agitate itself over. Accordingly for many years the records contain not much that is noticeable. The town organization, so far as offices were concerned, was complete after 1700, and an amount was annually appropriated to meet necessary expenses. This sum steadily increased, though its increase was caused probably as much by the fluctuating value of colonia] paper money as by the needs of a wealthier community. In 1701, for instance, the rate was forty pounds; motion was rejected. The warrant for the next townmeeting contained an article for the townsmen " to consider of, debate upon and agree about an answer to the petition of Edmund Quincy, Esq.," relating to a driftway through his land. And now a committee was appointed. Six months later, at a meeting held on the 28th December, Col. Quiney was chosen moderator, and this committee made its report. brief, but significant. They "were of opinion That the Records on the Town's Book Relating to an highway or Town driftway through the Lands of the said Quincy, etc., as may appear on Record baring Date February the 15th, 1714-15 be erased, made void, and be as tho' it had never been.

And it was then voted that the report of said Committee should be accepted with the Town." Subsequently, March 17, 1731, this way was regularly laid out and accepted. Other questions, which through this period continually occupied the attention of the town in a mild way, related to the six thousand acre grant, the unauthorized taking of stone from the commons, the hundred and sixty pounds; and when the Revolutionary troubles began it had grown to two hundred and fifty pounds. The minister's salary was not included in any of these levies, as after an early period the precinct rate was kept separate from the town rate. Townways were now laid out more frequently.

route to Boston, but in February, 1715, "a Town Driftway (not to by open) one rod and halfe wide" was laid through Col. Edmund Quincy's farm, on the

This action of the selectmen, though requested by Col. Quincy, seems to have led: to a question between him and the town. He was then the leading inhabitant of Braintree, serving as delegate to the General Court, acting as moderator of the town-meetings, and referred to in of the town, and, above all, the obstruction caused to the passage of alewives up into the Braintree ponds by the dam in the Monatiquot at the old iron-works. The freemen seem never to have been able to agree as to what should be done with the land grant, so they wrangled and debated over it, never reaching any definite conclusion. It was their land question of the day ; but, like most such questions, it is devoid of interest now. As respects the stone on the commons, there is an entry in the record of a special townmeeting held to consider the subject, on the 30th December, 1728, which is characteristic, and has in it a touch almost of humor. The meeting came together and chose a moderator. The record then proceeds as follows :

" After which they proceeded to act upon the first article or clause in the warrant, and after sundry votes were passed Preliminary or Introductory to an order or by-law concerning the stones, which seemed by those votes to be the thing designed, a vote for confirmation of what had passed was called for; but it passed in the negative, and so the whole affair was brought to a non pluss. The other articles in the warrant were discoursed on

He now made a claim against the town, and at a meeting held on the 25d of March, 1719, it was " propounded by the moderator whether the town would choose a committee to treat" with him as to compensation for any damage he might have sustained on account of the way laid out through his lands.

sary to Record the votes that had passed, seeing the things could not be effected ; a vote was asked whether the votes that had passed should be put on record, and it passed in the negative."

One Capt. Peter Adams had acted as moderator of this meeting in the absence of Major John Quincy, and it is apparent that he had not proved equal to the position. At the next town-meeting, held a month later, the question of dividing the town was brought up. It was voted to appoint a committee of eight to consider the subject, and to report at an adjourned meeting. Of this committee Major John Quincy was chairman, and upon it were several other prominent They presented their report on the 25th It was unanimous and consisted men. February following. of eight articles, looking apparently towards the proposed division. The reception it received was, considering the names that were attached to it, quite singular.

"After which, upon a motion made, the question was put whether the agreement of the committee should be voted article by article, and it passed in the negative.

Col. John Quincy at this time became Speaker of the provincial House of Representatives, which was engaged in its long and tedious dispute with Governor money which had been appropriated should be paid out of the treasury. That Braintree fully sympathized in the stand taken by the representatives on this subject became manifest the following year, when the advice and direction of the several towns to their members was desired. At a special town-meeting held on the 27th of September, 1731, it was

"After this, upon a motion made, the Question was put whether they would Reconsider their last vote, viz., of nonacceptance, and it was voted in the affirmative.

At another town-meeting held in the following May the report was again brought up, and the question was put whether the town would reconsider its former action; and again it passed in the negative. It is almost needless to add that nothing more was heard on the subject of dividing the town. people had emphatically shown that they were not ready for it, and the leaders, who seem to have worked the plan up, were obliged to abandon it. It was more than sixty years before the project was revived in a In practical form. with a motion or desire of the House of Representatives (Recommended to all such as have a Regard to New England's welfare) to raise money for the

Ksqrs., agents for the said house in the Court of Great Britain; to enable them to sollicite the affair and perpetuate the peace and tranquility of this ensue on the want thereof." The action of the town upon this matter showed that the leaders of public opinion bad not lost their heads. The article was " discoursed upon and the meeting being sensible that they could not (as a town) Raise money upon that Head the thing was Dismissed and the Inhabitants

Province (as we esteem they have hither done and which we highly approve) and Desire that they would continue strenuously to endeavour the maintaining and defending the same.''

But the matter which alone during this period seems to have stirred the town to its lowest depths was a controversy with Mr. Thomas Vinton, who in 1720 had purchased the land on which the Monato- The attempt to manufacture there had some time before been finally The dam which furnished water-power was still standing, and it seems now to have obstructed for no sufficient cause the passage of fish up the river during the spawning season. At the May town-meeting of 1736 the subject was brought up, and, aftera warm debate, a comquit Iron-works stood. iron abandoned as unprofitable.

"That they had been with Mr. Thomas Vinton and had asked of him on what terms he would quit his Claim to the River aforesaid; To which (they said) he made no answer. And Mr. Vinton being present at the meeting the moderator [Benjamin Neal] put the Question to him whether he would part with his Right in the River. To which he made answer that he would not sell his Right therein on any tearms what- The moderator then put the Question to the meeting whether they would defend their Rights in said River against It passed in the affirmative; against which John Hunt entered dissent. Then the Question was put whether they would raise money to defray It passed

"Then the Question was put whether they would chuse a Committee to Take care that the River be kept clear of all obstructions to the passage of the Fish and to prosecute in the Law all such as shall hinder or obstruct their passage in said

The committee now appointed was especially authorized to submit the whole matter in dispute to a reference of 'indifferent men," if Vinton would consent to so doing. He would come to no terms; and the Passage in Monaticut in any part thereof be removed." former committee, nor to add to it other 'meet persons,' but a wholly new committee was chosen, at the hundred pounds in bills of credit if he would quitclaim to the town all his right in the river, and discontinue legal proceedings against those who had been | concerned in the pulling down of the dam. " Mr. Vinton being present, declared his acceptance of the Town's offer, and promised to comply with their demands concerning a Deed of his Right in said |

River."' It was then voted that, after the committee had done what they should see cause to do about clearing the river, Mr. Vinton should be at "liberty" to take away the remainder of the stuff at any time at his leisure.

Yet another meeting was held before this matter was fully disposed of. strong feeling that the town had dealt too liberally with Vinton. come to order and chosen its moderator when '" Peter

Marquand appeared and declared that he had no warning to the meeting, and therefore desired his desent might be entered against the meeting and all that might be therein transacted."" Nevertheless, the town proceeded to tax itself to the amount of the three hundred pounds which it had agreed to pay Mr. Vinton. But its action did not pass without a strong protest from the minority. No less than twenty-four persons insisted upon having their names recorded in opposition.

Not content with thus removing obstacles in the way of the passage of fish, the town a few years later tried its hand at the artificial development of an infant industry, thus foreshadowing the national protective policy of a century later. At the March meeting of 1755 a formal vote was passed for the encouragement of the '' Bank Codfishery to be sett up and carried on Those concerned in this business, whether inhabitants of Braintree or elsewhere, were to have their poll-taxes remitted to them for the space of three years. A proviso was added that all such persons from other places should be subject to the approval of the selectmen; and, if not approved by them, might be " warned out of Town according to Law." offered does not seem to have been sufficient to build up an artificial industry. Accordingly, as the years went by, the people were not drawn on from point to point in the singular process of taxing profitable industry to keep alive some industry which is not profitable.

'The votes being called for, brot in and examined, it appeared that Col. Josiah Quincy, Mr. Jonathan Allen, Mr. Benjamin Porter were chosen by a majority of votes. Capt. Richard Brackett and Capt. Eben Thayer, Junr., were chosen according to the usual custom of said Town as having more votes than any others, and were Declared Selectmen by the Moderator according to the custom of said Town. Upon which and much Dispute Respecting the Legality of the aforesaid choice, Messrs. William Penniman, Samuel Bass, Peter Adams, Jonathan Raw- against the proceedings of the said meeting. After much Debate Respecting the Legality of Capt. Brackett and Capt. Thayer's choice as selectmen, the Question was put by - the Modr. Voted and passed in the affirmative."

The last struggle with the French and Indians was at this time already two years old. Braddock had been defeated before Fort Duquesne in July, 1755, and in May, 1756, war between Great Britain and France had been formally declared. Pitt was in office. The massacre at Fort George occurred in

757; in 1758 Cape Breton was captured by the English, and on the 17th of September, 1759, Wolfe and Montcalm both fell on the Heights of Abrabam. The next year the conquest of Canada by the English was ing school at Worcester. He describes how Amherst | with his little army of four thousand men passed | through the town on his way from Louisburg to | Crown Point. '' The officers were very social, spent | their evenings and took their suppers with such of the | us with their music and their dances. Many of them | were Scotchmen in their plaids, and their music was delightful ; even the bag-pipe was not disagreeable." | Then came the siege of Fort William Henry, during | which almost every day couriers came down from the - frontier bearing earnest appeals for men and supplies.

tenor of its ancient ways. there is no trace of these great events. interest attached to them. (Questions of commons and | ways were discussed, fines were imposed or remitted, schools were provided for, and from £60 to £150 was annually ordered to be levied to meet the current expenses of the town. Butof the stress of war in the

A partial examination of | the provincial muster-rolls has shown that between | 1756 and 1760 more than two hundred Braintree men did military service. Some were impressed; the

Twenty-eight took part in the unfortunate Crown Point expedition of 1756, serving during that season only. Hutchinson says that "when the main body of the enemy went back to Canada, the provincial army broke up and returned to the government in which it had been raised.

encamped. Many died upon the road, and many died of the camp distemper after they were at home." Upon the rolls Joseph Blanchard, of Braintree, ap- | pears as a deserter. | The next year the capitulation of Fort William | Henry spread a panic all through New England. | Those living west of the Connecticut were ordered to | destroy their wheel carriages and to drive in their | eattle. The authorities hoped to hold the line of the Nearly the whole military force of the colony was called to arms. From Braintree, Capt. Peter | Thayer's company was marched as far as Roxbury. They lay there in camp for some days, and then, the alarm having subsided, returned home.

appeal of Pitt, Massachusetts put forth what she then supposed to be her utmost efforts. A levy of seven thousand men was ordered. Forty-five hundred only could be raised by voluntary enlistment, and the remainder had to be drafted. They composed part of the force which operated against Ticonderoga, and at their head Lord Howe was killed. Among them were at least thirty men from Braintree ; and during the same season twelve more enlisted on the ship of war " King George." The next year (1759) witnessed the fall of Quebec, and brought the war to a practical close. While Wolfe, with his regulars, moved against Quebec, the provincial levies relieved the garrisons of Nova Scotia. To this foree Braintree contributed a quota of some forty men, while more took part in the operations under Amherst which resulted in the

The terms of enlistment during this war were short, and the name of the same man often appears more than once on the rolls. But during these three years it is probably safe to say that Braintree furnished, apart from the promenade of Capt. Thayer's company in August, 1757, one hundred different men for actual service. The population of the town was then about two thousand, of whom some five hundred were males above sixteen. From this it would appear that at least one man in each three capable of bearing arms was put into the field.

With the close of the French war a new generation came on the Braintree stage. The last recorded appearance of John Quincy at the town meetings was in noticed. Deacon John Adams, though a selectman in 1758, was not again chosen to that office, and he died two years later. But this year, though his name does not appear on the records, the younger John Adams has asserted that he was chosen surveyor of highways. From this time forward his presence in

The active, inquiring mind was at work Accordingly, in the town-meeting of May, 1761, we find him engaged in his crusade against intemperance, persuading the town to regulate its licensed houses Then in 1765 he induced it to abandon the old system of repairing highways, A committee, of which he was a member, made a report outlining the

Meanwhile a new set of questions begins to loom up. The report in favor of selling the north commons was presented at the town-meeting of April 1, 1765,

"T drew up a petition to the selectmen of Braintree, and procured it to be signed by a number of the respectable inhabitants, to call a meeting of the town to instruct their representa- | render us the most sordid and forlorn of slaves?

Magna Charta, laying down the principle as " grand and fundamental," that ''no freeman should be subject to any tax to which he has not given his own any concern there! ... What Justice and Impartiality are we at Three thousand miles distance from the fountain to expect from such a Judge of Admiralty. We all along thought the Acts of Trade in this Respects a grievance. But the Stamp

"T prepared a draught of instructions at home and carried them with me. The cause of the meeting was explained at some length, and the state and danger of the country pointed out; a committee was appointed to prepare instructions, of which I was nominated as one. We retiredto Mr. Niles' house; my draught was produced, and unanimously adopted without amendment, reported to the town, and accepted without a dissenting voice.

with some of an opposite nature coming at the same time from the town of Marblehead, a correspondent of the Hvening Post picked out at the time one paragraph as '" worthy to be wrote in lettersof gold." It was the following :

"We further Recommend the most Clear and explicit assertion and vindication of our Rights and Liberties to be entered on the Public Records that the world may know in the present and all future Generations, that we have a clear knowledge and a just sense of those Rights and Liberties and that with submission to divine Providence, we never can be slaves."

The authorship of this paper brought the young Braintree lawyer into great popular prominence. Accordingly, it was upon the 18th of the following December that the town of Boston retained him to appear with Gridley and Otis before the Governor and Council in support of the memorial praying that the courts of law might be opened. It was a week later, on Christmas day, that he and his wife " drank tea at Grandfather Quincy's" at Mount Wollaston, and found the "old gentleman inquisitive about the A few days after, referring to the dangers of the times, he wrote in his diary, '' Let the towns

So intense was the popular feeling, that politics had now fairly taken possession of the pulpit. For instance, the Rev. Ebenezer Gay, of Hingham, had preached tinctly submission to authority and a recourse to "prayers and tears, not clubs." This discourse greatly disturbed the Hingham people, who got so far as to believe that their worthy pastor had the stamps in his house, and they even threatened to go and search it for them. This feeling was not allayed when, the next Sabbath, Parson Smith, of Weymouth, preached a sermon in the Hingham pulpit in which he recommended obedience to good rules and a spirited opposition to bad ones, interspersed with a many sermons against the ingratitude, injustice, disloyalty, treason, rebellion, impiety, and ill policy of refusing obedience to the Stamp Act. eloquent.

The church clergy, to be sure, will be very The church people, are, many of them, favorers of the Stamp Act at present. Major Miller, forsooth, is very fearful that they will be stomach/ful at home (England), and angry and resentful. Mr. Veasey insists upon it that we ought to pay our proportion of the public burdens. fully convinced that they, that is the Parliament, have a right to tax us; he thinks it is wrong to goon with business; we had better stop and wait till Spring, till we hear from home. o« . Litter is another of the poisonous talkers, Cleverly and Veasey are slaves in principle; they are devout, religious slaves, and a religious bigot is the worst were to be elected, Braintree was alive with excitement and intrigue. The church party was anxious not to lose the degree of influence it still had, and its members accordingly professed to have seen new light. Mr. Cleverly, for instance, was not so clear as he had been that Parliament had a right to tax the colonies ; indeed, he was inclined to think it had not. For selectmen he proposed a combination ticket, - Col. Josiah Quincy and Major Ebenezer Miller, the former being a stanch patriot. At last the day for the town-meeting came, and John Adams, who long afterwards spoke of it as "the first popular struggle

'the north end people," after voting for ' Cornet Bass" once, "withdrew for refreshment," and during their absence in the bar of Ebenezer Thayer's tavern, just across the road, another vote was taken and their candidate defeated. A fortnight later, on the 18th of March, the newly chosen selectman met Major Miller, who, though a Tory then and afterwards, was a worthy man and useful member of his church and town. The successful candidate gave this account of the interview : "Went to Weymouth; stopped at was the tavern at the Miller soon afterwards other without wrath or great degree of either, though I must own I did not feel exactly as I used to in his company,and I am sure by his face and eyes that he did not in mine.

planted on the triangle made by the three roads, by the house of Mr. James Bracket. has on it an inscription, 'The Tree of Liberty, and cursed is ... I never heard a hint of it till T saw it, but I hear that some persons grumble, and threaten to

On the 16th of May, 1766, news of the repeal of the Stamp Act reached Boston and was the cause of general rejoicing. For some reason the event was not noticed in Braintree, which John Adams pronounced "insensible to the common joy," declaring

""My brother Peter, Mr. Etter, and Mr. Field, having a number of votes prepared for Mr. Quiney and me, set themselves to scatter them. The town had been very silent and still, made they fell in and assisted, and although there were six different hats with votes for as many different persons, besides a considerable number of scattering votes, [ had the major vote of the assembly the first time. Mr. Quincy had more than one hundred and sixty votes. I had but one vote more than half. .. . Etter and my brother took a skillful method... . Many persons, I hear, acted slyly and deceitfully ; this is always the case... . Mr. Jo. Bass was extremely sorry for the loss of Major Miller; he would never come to another meeting. Mr. Jo. Cleverly could not account for many things done at at first instructed its representative to vote against the proposed indemnity. The inhabitants desired '" at all times to bear their testimony against such unlawful and abusive practices, but as they were in no wise accessory to the mischief committed they did not judge that they could be justly charged with the damages." At another meeting, held in December, Mr. Thayer was instructed to vote for indemnity. The

1 Apparently this tree was planted in a vacant grass-plot which then stood where the roads united diagonally opposite to where the Episcopal Church now is. Dr. Pattee (p. 378) says that it died a natural death eight years later.

In the following March, Norton Quincy and John Adams were again elected selectmen, and Major Miller appears at the head of the fence-viewers and surveyors of highways; but the next year John Adams, who was then in active law practice in Boston, asked to be excused from further service. Not only did the town excuse him, but it passed a formal vote thanking him "for his services as selectman for two years past.'" There is no other case of such a vote of thanks, and the occasion for it does not appear. Mr. Adams may have declined to receive pay for his services, but if he did, the fact was not stated. Though fast rising into professional eminence, he was at the time a man of only thirty, and there seems no reason why a town which for generations had seen colonels and judges and counselors serving it as selectmen should have been especially grateful to the son of Deacon Adams because he filled for a brief period the office to which his father had been thirteen times elected. It would seem probable, therefore, that, for reasons which do not now appear, his services were known to have been of peculiar value.

After the repeal of the Stamp Act there was a lull in the agitation. Yet the troubled waters did not grow wholly calm before, in 1767, Parliament passed the Import Act. The popular alarm over that measure is next reflected in the record of town-meetings. The warrant, for instance, for that in Braintree at | which John Adams declined re-election as selectman, contained an article for the town to agree upon "' some effectual Method to promote Economy, Industry, and Manufactures, thereby to prevent the unnecessary importation of European commodities, which threaten the country with poverty and Ruin." This article of the warrant was referred to a committee which reported at once that, in view of the decay of trade, the scarcity of money, and the heavy public debt, the town should use its utmost endeavors towards the suppression of extravagance, idleness and vice, and to promote industry, economy and good morals.

"And in order to prevent the unnecessary exportation of money, of which this Province has of late been so much drained, it is further voted, that this Town will, by all prudent overawe the Massachusetts Colony. Boston again took the lead in agitation, and a formal committee from its town-meeting waited on Governor Barnard, asking, in view of the well-authenticated character of the rumor, that the General Court shouid be called together. It was not supposed that this request would be complied with ; but the refusal to comply with it gave the popular leaders a pretext for taking the next step to which they now saw their way. The town of Boston by circular letters invited all the other towns As Hutchinson said, this act " had a greater tendency towards a revolution in government than any preceding measure in The inhabitants of one town alone took upon them to convene an assembly from all the towns, that, in everything but in name, would This was the exact The appeal was direct to the New England town system. In that system, acting through town-meetings called in a perfectly legal way, the

Was open to a reorganization of the whole. produce its results. Without having recourse to any suddenly improvised political machinery, with no noise or confusion, but acting quietly through their accustomed local organizations, the people of Massachusetts were in the most natural manner conceivable about to take the management of their affairs into their own hands.

In this work Braintree only did its share. John Adams had removed to Boston, and was now busy with his law books. Yet both this year and the year after he drew up the Boston instructions to its representatives. When the Braintree town-meeting was held, on the 26th of September, Col. Josiah Quincy and Ebenezer Thayer were chosen to repre- A_letter of instructions to them was at the same meeting read and approved and ordered to be spread on the recsent the town in the proposed convention.

and during this period many of them are to be found in the records of the towns - are no longer interesting reading. They relate to issues long since decided, and set forth principles which few now care to dispute ; but historically, they are of the utmost value. Generally well written, though in the somewhat turgid style of the day, they almost always show a clear idea both of what was wanted and of the means through which it was proposed to get it. That such papers should have ema- shows more clearly than anything else the generally high standard of political thought which then prevailed. Nor were these papers the work of a few leaders in advance of the people. The whole popular

"Ist. That we apprehend the state of the rights of the colonists, and of this Province in particular, together with a list of the infringements and violations of those rights, as stated in the town-meeting. same mould as those of Braintree. It was one voice, It was the voice of an intelligent people moving by an accustomed path towards a given end which they distinctly saw. Hence there was nothing strange, irregular, or moblike in their action. Even when engaged in a revolution they elaborately argued every measure, and

First are the town instructions to its representative in relation to the Stamp Act; last is the Declaration of Independence. tions to Col. Quincy and Ebenezer Thayer, delegates

"2d. That all taxations, by what name soever called, imposed upon us without our consent by any earthly power, are unconstitutional, oppressive, and tend to enslave us.

"3d. That as our Fathers left their native Country and Friends in order that they and their Posterity might enjoy that civil and religious Liberty here which they could not enjoy there, we, their descendants, are determined by the grace of God that our consciences shall not accuse us with having acted unworthy such pious and venerable Heroes, and that we will, by all Lawful took each new step in careful conformity with law | ways and means, preserve at all events all our civil and religious rights and priviledges.

"Ath. That by the divine constitution of things there is such a connection between civil and religious Liberty, that in whator ever survives long after. Of this History furnishes abundant evidence.

"Sth. That all Civil officers are, or ought to be, Servants to the people, and dependent upon them for their official support; and every instance to the contrary, from the Governor downward, tends to crush and destroy civil liberty.

"6th. That we bear true loyalty to our Lawful king, George the 3d, and unfeigned affection to our Brethren in Great Brittain and Ireland, and to all our Sister Colonies, and so long as our mother-country protects us in our Charter rights and privileges,

23, 1775, to Deacon Joseph Palmer, town delegate to the Provincial Congress held at Cambridge ; and, March 15th, the full covenant for non-importation, non-consumption, and non-exportation then recommended by the Continental Congress.

age, Gen. Palmer was an ardent patriot, and in 1774 represented Braintree in the Provincial Congress. which the Boston report was referred. says that the responses of "some of the towns were very high and inflammatory." Perhaps he so classed those of Braintree. ured way, they were certainly explicit, and clearly revealed the advance of public opinion. a declaration of political independence was but one step, and not along one. Yet these resolves were mote the welfare of the whole British Empire, which we earnestly pray may flourish uninterruptedly in the paths of righteousness till time shall be no more.

"7th. That Mr. Thayer, our Representative, be directed, and he hereby is directed, to use his utmost endeavors that a Day of Fasting and Prayer be appointed throughout the Province for

Events now moved rapidly. On the 18th of December of this year (1773) the tea was thrown into Boston Harbor, Deacon Palmer's son from Braintree aiding in the work. On the Ist of the following June, Governor Hutchinson sailed away from Boston into his life-long exile, and the same day the Port Bill went into effect. During June also the General Court appointed five delegates to represent the province in the first Continental Congress; and August 10th, John Adams set off with his colleagues for Philadelphia, having previously moved his wife and

For this latter committee there was then supposed to be special need in Braintree. The town powder was stored in a small building on the common in the North Precinct, and some anxiety was felt as to its safety. Owing to the presence of the Church of England people, the North Precinct was looked upon as a Tory hot-bed. Party feeling there certainly ran high, '(and very hard words and threats of blows upon both sides were given out." In the course of the month of September, Gen. Gage sent two companies of soldiers over to Charlestown, and secured some ammunition stored there. ering next day at Cambridge, and the excitement soon spread through the neighboring towns. Mrs. John Adams then tells the story of what occurred in Braintree:

"The report took here on Friday, and on Sunday a soldier was seen lurking about the Common, supposed to be a spy, but most likely a deserter. However, intelligence of it was communicated to the other parishes, and about eight o'clock Sunday evening there passed by here about two hundred men, preceded by a horse-cart, and marched down to the powder-house, from whence they took the powder, and carried it into the other parish, and there secreted it. JI opened the window upon their return. They passed without any noise, not a word among them until they came against this house, when some of them, perceiving me, asked me if I wanted any powder. I replied, 'No, since it is in such good hands.' The reason they gave for taking it was that we had so many Tories here they dared not trust us with it; they had taken Vinton! in their train, and upon their return they stopped between Cleverly's and Etter's Upon his producing them, they put it to vote whether they should burn them, and it passed in theaffirmative. They then made a circle and burntthem. They then called a vote whether they should huzza, but, it being Sunday evening, it passed in the negative. They called upon Vinton to swear that he would never be instrumental in carrying into execution any of these new acts.

rest. A few days afterwards, upon his making some foolish speeches, they assembled to the amount of two or three hundred, and swore vengeance upon him unless he took a solemn oath. Accordingly, they chose a committee and sent it with him to Major Miller's to see that he complied; and they waited his return, which, proving satisfactory, they dispersed. appears as high as you can well imagine, and, if necessary,

1 The Vinton here mentioned was Capt. John Vinton, of Braintree Middle Precinct. He was then deputy sheriff, and as such had in his hands a number of the newly-issued warrants for summoning juries, in pursuance of the act of Parliament for new modeling the government of Massachusetts.

was at a later time an earnest patriot, and held a commission in the Revolutionary army. (Vinton Joseph Cleverly and Peter Etter were both members of the Braintree Episcopal church, and they lived on the old Plymouth road, near Penn's Hill, and were accordingly neighbors of Mrs. Adams. It has already been seen (ante, p. 332) that Etter was a warm political friend of John Adams.

Church parson thought they were coming after him, and ran up garret; they say another jumped out of his window and hid among the corn, whilst a third crept under a board fence and told his beads."

The powder was removed on Sunday, September 4th, and the alarm caused among the church people by such proceedings was naturally great. Their sympathizers were almost wholly confined to Boston, and accordingly exaggerated rumors soon began to get currency there of the dangers to which Mr. Winslow and the members of his society were exposed. Lexington and Concord were still six months in the future, and public feeling had not yet reached the pitch of These rumors accordingly scandalized the law-abiding sentiment of Braintree, and early in October the matter was brought to the notice of an adjourned townmeeting. The following preamble and vote were then passed :

"WHEREAS, a report has been spread in the Town of Boston and other places that a considerable Number of People in this Town had entered intoa combination to Disturb and harrass the Reverend Mr. Winslow and other members of the church of England, with a letter to oblidge them to leavethe Town. And no evidence appearing to support the charge, Therefore

"Voted, That said report is Malicious, false and injurious, and calculated to defame this Town, and that we protest against all such combinations as being subversive of good Government. We being as ready to allow that right of private judgment to others which we claim for ourselves.

Peter Etter was a German by extraction, and one of the company that undertook the development of glass-works in Braintree in 1752. He continued to be an inhabitant of the town after that enterprise failed, and took an active part in public affairs. Though apparently a churchman, he seems to have been on excellent social and political terms with John Adams, who used, with his wife, to take tea with him ; and apparently it was well known in the town that on public issues he did not sympathize with his rector. It was not so with all. Major Miller evidently stood He had served acceptably in many offices, and was on the board of selectmen as late as 1772. But he belonged to the church and the gentry, - the class of the Apthorps, Borlands, and Vassalls, - and at the very meeting which passed the votes just quoted all persons in the town who felt " aggrieved by the conduct of others respecting our public affairs' were enjoined to go to a committee of observation, then appointed, who were " desired, if possible, to remove the grounds of uneasiness (if real), and direct all inquiries." pulpit and entered in the records of the town, Mrs. Adams, on the 29th of September, 1776, wrote to her husband: "The church is opened here every Sunday, and the king prayed for, as usual, in open defiance of Congress." surprise at '' prayers in public for an abdicated king," and declared that nothing of the kind was heard anywhere in the country except New York and Brain- tree. the State, and cannot be long tolerated." and in other respects, Mr. Winslow was probably more discreet, but it has already been observed that he felt bound by his ordination oath to conform literally to the ritual, and he did so until at last the long-suppressed popular feeling found open expression.

Braintree, though it doubtless made the lives of those suspected miserable enough at the time, seems, so far us actual residents in the town were concerned, to have resulted only in the expatriation of Samuel Quincy, the Borlands, and the Rev. Edward Winslow. The other suspects quietly accepted the situation. Returning to the autumn of 1774, after the seizure of the powder on the 4th of September Braintree Returning from a visit to Salem, Mrs. Adams stopped at

Oliver Gay, and Nedabiah Bent. The following names were then added: Joseph Cleverly (second), William Veazie, Jr., Henry Cleverly, and Thomas Brackett. All of these persons it was then voted not for righteousness' action of the indictment of the whole society, for among the names of those recorded as " inimical" were its rector, its Yet Mr. alone would seem to have left the town,

In any event his occupation in Braintree was gone. Against the other members of the society proceedings do not seem to have been pressed, and afterwards they all of them become good citizens of the United States, their names again appearing in the Braintree and Quincy records, and, at last, on the stones in the graveyard. Later a certain amount of property in Braintree was seized and sold because of Tory owner- not a slave in the province; it always appeared a most iniquitous scheme to me to fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to

Inthe form of covenant " very unanimously" adopted in the Braintree town-meeting of 15th March following the date of this letter there appears this clause, -

"We will neither import, or purchase any slave imported since the first day of December last, and will wholly discontinue the slave trade; and will neither be concerned in it ourselves, nor will we hire our vessels, nor sell our commodities or manufactures to those who are concerned in it."

The two utterances taken together are significant, for Mr. Adams had returned from Philadelphia in October, 1774, it was he, doubtless, who draughted the covenant. Immediately on his getting back to Braintree the town had chosen him as an additional delegate to the Provincial Congress, Messrs. Thayer and Palmer having been previously elected. He had passed the winter at home, and as soon as the covenant was adopted he came forward with another report as chairman of a committee on minute-men. It was voted to raise three companies, one in each precinet, to be composed of forty-one men each, including officers. Provision had already been made in January for military drill, and payment for attendance thereat ; and now the minute-men in prompt attendand and if there were no funds in the treasury they were to borrow on the town's credit. On the 19th of April occurred the affair of Lexington and Concord, and on the 24th the adjourned town-meeting directed the selectmen to "dismiss Mr. Rice, their Grammar School master as soon as their present engagements are expired." It was evidently thought that there was no flocking over the Plymouth road and down Penn's Hill to Braintree. The wildest rumors were circulated. Three hundred men had been landed! They were marching into Weymouth village! They Meanwhile the companies of minute-men came rapidly in, showing sufhciently well what a hornet's nest the region was.

They came from distances of twenty miles and more. Those from Braintree were naturally among the first on the ground. Young Elihu Adams, also a son of

We have noschool. I know not what to do with John." This John was her oldest son, John Quincy, then a boy of seven, who, eighteen months later, she again

Boston, that the need of supplies would oblige Gen. Gage to send out parties along the shore. the salt-water neighborhoods, the North Precinct was accordingly in great and perpetual terror of forays. On the 4th of May, Mrs. Adams wrote: '" There has been no descent upon the sea-coast. regularly kept." who had died only a few weeks before, was then at the house of her father-in-law in the North Precinet, - the house, already referred to, in which President Josiah Quincy, of Harvard College, subsequently lived and died. to see her there, " and in the afternoon, from an alarm they had she and her sister with three others of the family, took refuge with [Mrs. Adams] and tarried all night." Deacon Holbrook, of the Middle Precinct, for a place of retreat, if he needed one; and Mr. Cranch, who lived at Germantown, did the same with Maj. Bass.

dysentery contracted in camp during the siege of Boston, was in command of the Braintree company, and also one of the party which went out to drive the marauders away from Sheep Island, where they were foraging. This they succeeded in doing without loss to themselves.

Through all these events Mrs. Adams wrote that her house, being on the main road, was a scene of lasting confusion. '' Soldiers coming in fora lodging, for breakfast, for supper, for drink, etc. Sometimes refugees from Boston, tired and fatigued, seek an asylum for a day, a night, a week.' Meanwhile her husband was writing: '" Let me caution you, my dear, to be upon your guard against the multitude of affrights and alarms which, I fear, will surround you;" but a little later he exclaims, ' Oh, that I were

All this was in May. At last, on the morning of Saturday, June 17th, a heavy cannonading to the The British ships of war in Boston Harbor were firing at the breastwork which had been thrown up the night before on the crest of Bunker's Hill. The only records which have come down to us showing how that day was passed by those dwelling in Braintree are found itable conflict drawing always nearer. At last, on Sunday morning, May 21st, Braintree had a veritable alarm, - the enemy was actually at its door. Three sloops and a cutter had come out from Boston Harbor and dropped anchor in Weymouth fore-river, not far from Germantown. Before six o'clock alarm-guns were heard, and shortly after the bells began to ring. Then the minute-men fell in at tap of drum on the the distant cannon, the mother, then a woman of a little more than thirty, taking with her the child of eight, went out to the neighboring Penn's Hill, and, climbing to its summit, looked towards Boston. It was a clear June day of intense heat, and across the blue bay they saw, against the horizon, the dense black volume of smoke which rolled away from the burning houses of Charlestown. Over the crest of the distant hill hung the white clouds which told of the was taking place before their eyes, and now of the husband and father so far away at the Congress, they dreamed not at all of the great future for him and for the boy to be surely worked out in that conflict, the first pitched battle of which was then being fought before them.

"The battle began upon our intrenchments upon Bunker's Hill Saturday morning, about three o'clock, and has not ceased yet, and it is now three o'clock Sabbath afternoon. Charlestown is laid in ashes. It is expected they will come out over the Neck to-night, and adreadful battle must ensue. Almighty God, cover the heads of our countrymen, and be a shield to our dear friends! How many have fallen we know not. Theconstant roar of the cannon is so distressing that we cannot eat, drink, or sleep. My bursting heart must find vent at my pen. 'The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong ; but the God of Israel is He that giveth strength and power unto his people. hearts before him; God is a refuge for us.' "'

North Precinct church, nor had there been on the Sunday before. "They delight in molesting us on the Sabbath," wrote Mrs. Adams. But at last, on the 25th of June, "we have sat under our own vine in The good man was earnest and pathetic; I could forgive his weakness for the sake of his sincerity." Nor did her own pastor fully meet the spiritual needs of this lady, for presently she speaks of him as " our inanimate old bachequietness; have heard Mr. Taft.

lor,' whom she " could not bear to hear ;"' and then says that he 'made the best oration (he never prays, you know) I ever heard from him." Two companies of soldiers were now stationed in the town, - that of Capt. Turner, at Germantown, and that of Capt. Vinton, at Squantum. Presently they were engaged in small affairs in the harbor; but, before this, their presence led to a town-meeting episode which showed ple. The descendants of the Puritans bore freshly in memory the fact that Cromwell had with his soldiery dispersed the Long Parliament. The town was to power would be wrested out of the hands of the civil magistrate. He insisted upon its being put to vote, and carried his point immediately."

During the night of the 9th of July a body of three hundred volunteers put out in whale-boats from Germantown, and crossed over to Long Island, where they seized some cattle, sheep, and prisoners, and brought them off without being discovered from the vessels lying near. Their emulation being fired by this achievement, a few days later another party put off from the Moon Island, opposite Squantum, in open day, and fired the house and barn which the previous party had spared. Though exposed to a sharp fire from the enemy's ships, the whole force returned in safety, and only one of the,covering party on the Moon was killed. Then all the companies guarding the south side of the bay were ordered to go to Nantasket, and cut and bring away the ripened grain. While there, and under the eyes of several men-ofwar, they crossed over in their whale-boats and set fire to the light-house. Returning, they were fired upon and pursued, but got back without loss. Gen. Gage thereupon sent a force of carpenters, under and caused a new lamp to beset up. In consequence of this, on Sunday evening, the 29th, a body of men went off from Squantum in the whale-boats, surprised and overcame the guard, killing the lieutenant in command and one man, and completely destroyed the killed. Two days after he was buried from Germantown. These were the only military operations undertaken during the siege of Boston from Quincy Bay ; and though, as Mrs. Adams wrote, they were in themselves but trifling affairs, yet they served "to inure our men and harden them to danger."

The summer was hot and dry. There was meat to be had in abundance, but at one time it seemed probable that the corn crop would prove a failure, and famine might thus be added to war. Tea, coffee, and sugar became very scarce, but '' whortleberries and milk we are not obliged to commerce for." The camps about Boston, swarming with raw, untrained levies, were not properly policed, nor were the food and mode of life such as the men were accustomed to. As a matter of course sickness ensued. The state of continual excitement and alarm in which the people of the neighboring towns had long been living naturally predisposed them to disease, and when the camp sickness took the form of dysentery it soon became epidemic and spread rapidly. Then followed some weeks It was a time of pestilence. In Braintree Mr. Wibird was stricken down, and all through August and September the Sabbath services

'The small-pox in the natural way was not more mortal than this distemper has proved in this and many neighboring towns. .. Mrs. Randall has lost her daughter. Mrs. Bracket hers. Mr. Thomas Thayer his wife. I know of eight this week who have been buriedin this town. count five of my near connections laid in the grave...

find a well person to assist in looking after the sick. bird lies bad, Major Miller is dangerous, and Mr. Gay is not expected to live. ... We have fevers of various kinds, the throat distemper, as well as the dysentery prevailing in this and the neighboring towns.

of any distemper, except the plague, than this. . . So mortal a time the oldest man does not remember." So wrote Mrs. Adamsto her husband. His brother

Elihu, who had just taken a commission in the army, was among the earliest victims. Returning home at that time, John Adams had started back to Philadelphia on the 26th of August, and between that day and the 8th of September there were eighteen persons buried in the Middle Precinct alone. The disease was supposed to be contagious, so that watchers and nurses could be obtained only with difficulty, and the

A servant was first taken down; she herself was then seized; another servant followed, and then one of her children; a third servant fell sick, and had to be moved to Weymouth, where she afterwards died.

was almost ready to faint under this severe and heavy stroke, separated from thee, who used to be a comforter to me in afiliction; but, blessed be God! his earis not heavy that He cannot hear, but He has bid us call upon Him in time of trouble."

Quincy watched, from an upper window of his house, the ship that bore Gen. Gage down the harbor on his way home to England. The pane of glass is still preserved on which he then scratched a record of the incident. But six months more were to pass before the evacuation of Boston. the apprehension of attack along the Braintree shore was continual; but those dwelling there had become accustomed to it, and took the alarms more quietly. Col. Quincey wrote, -

" Although we have five companies stationed near us, yet the shells thrown from the floating batteries and the flat-bottomed boats which row with twenty oars, carry fifty men each, and are defended with cannon and swivels, keep us under perpetual apprehension of being attacked whenever we shall become an object of sufficient magnitude to excite the attention of our enemies. Our circumstances are truly melancholy, and grow rather worse than better."

Towards the end of October the sickness abated, and as the winter came on the situation became in every way more endurable. Money, it was true, had already become scarce. Paper currency was at a discount of ten per cent., and a silver dollar was a great rarity. Prices had begun to rise. Those of foreign goods had doubled. Molasses was an article in common household use; its ordinary price had risen from twenty-five cents a gallon to forty. Of the domestic products, corn was sixty-five cents a bushel, rye eighty, hay twenty dollars a ton, and wood three dollars and a half a cord. abundant.

a state of siege only ten miles away, with the exception that the greater part of the able-bodied men were away in camp, life went on in Braintree much as usual. This continued until March, the war and its incidents being, meanwhile, the great subject of discussion. Rumors of what was going on in camp and in Congress were abundant. Among others, there came a story, which was industriously briited about, that Hancock and John Adams had both left Philadelphia, and sailed for England from New York on board an English man-of-war. In other words, In the morbid condition of the public mind, even this absurd story gained credence. Angry disputes took place in Braintree taverns, and 'some men were collared and dragged out of the shop with great threats for reporting such scandalous lies." Norton Quincy, then one of the selectmen, seems to have been especially excited over the calumny. Though a man of indolent temper, he went so far as to offer his own life as a forfeit for that of the husband of his niece, should the report prove true. But, a mere war rumor, it was soon forgotten. Indeed, the beginning of new military operations soon drove all such wild ideas out of the people's heads. .

On the 3d of March the sound of heavy cannonading from the direction of Boston warned the people of Braintree that new movements were going on. The militia were all mustered, and marched away with three days' rations. Scarcely a man was left in town, and the place of those serving as sea-coast

"T have just returned," wrote Mrs. Adams, " from Penn's Hill, where I have been sitting to hear the amazing roar of cannon, and from whence I could see every shell which was thrown. I went to bed about twelve, and rose again a little after one. the engagement; the rattling of the windows, the jar of the house, the continual roar of twenty-four pounders, and the About six this morning there was quiet. I I hear we got possession of ing more was effected than the occupation of Dorchester Heights. 'I hoped and expected more important and decisive scenes. I suffered all I have for two such hills." A fortnight later the evacuation of Boston had been decided upon. 'Between seventy and eighty vessels of various sizes are gone down and lie in a row in fair sight of this place, all of which appear to be loaded." The fear of marauding parties was so great at this think of nothing but fortifying Boston Harbor. I want more cannon than are to be had. I want a fortification upon Point Alderton, one upon Lovell's Island, one upon George's Island, several upon Long Island, one upon the Moon, one upon Squan- I want to hear of half a dozen fire-ships, and two or I want to hear of row-galleys, floating batteries built, and booms laid across the channel I wish to cruised about the bay for several weeks longer. They seemed reluctant to give up all pretence of maintaining a hold on Boston. At the end of May, Mrs. Adams wrote: '" We have now in fair sight of my uncle's [ Norton Quincy's house, at Mount Wollaston] the ' Commodore, a thirty-six gun frigate, another large vessel, and six small eraft." At last military movements were made under orders from the patriot authorities looking to the occupation of the islands. In consequence of these the last remnant of the fleet, ""¢ Commodore' and all,'' put to sea upon the 14th of June, and '' not a transport, a ship, or a tender [was next day] to be seen." Braintree, in common with her sister-towns on Boston Bay, was thereafter allowed to rest in peace.

stock; but yesterday, in the afternoon we were happily relieved by the appearance of a number of whale-boats, stretching across our bay, under the command (as I have since learned) cannonading the ships, with one or more field-pieces, from the east head of Thompson's Island, and I suppose last night cannonaded them from the same place, or from Spectacle Island. This judicious manceuvre had its genuine effect ; for, this morning, the Admiral and all the rest of the ships, except one of the line, came to sail, and fell down to Nantasket Road, where a countless number is now collected."

"From Penn's Hill we have a view of the largest fleet ever seen in America. You may count upwards of a hundred and seventy sail. They look like a forest. ... To what quarter of the world they are bound is wholly unknown; but it is generally thought to New York. Many people are elated with their quitting Boston. I confess I do not feel so. 'Tis only lifting a burden from one shoulder to the other, which is perhaps less able or less willing to support it... . Every foot of ground which they obtain now they must fight for, and may was the struggle a novelty. The glow of excitement which stimulated and made easy the first patriotic movement had passed away. In its place came a consciousness of the drag and drain of aseemingly endless war. In this respect the experience of one generation is but a repetition of that of another. The ugly details of the past are forgotten, while whatever there was of heroic about it stands out clean cut and prominent. On the other hand, the selfish, venal spirit of the present makes itself painfully apparent, and is supposed always to be of recent development, - one of the characteristics of a race degenerate. <A careful examination of the record reveals a different story. The years between 1860 and 1865 will lose nothing by contrast with those between 1776 and 1782. In each case the conflict opened on a people wild with All were burning to do something ; many could not do too much. Money was poured out like water; regiments formed as if by magic. Selfsacrifice was the order of the day, and life in the For the time being a whole people had become heroic. Then came the reaction. The realities of war bepatriotic ardor.

gan to be felt. nlistments fell off in 1776, as they did in 1862. proportion to the more pressing need of men. Values were unsettled. Prices rose. The poorer and more selfish natures began to show the baseness of which

Those above forty years of age, and the halt, the lame, and the blind must be exempted. During the years 1776 to 1782, therefore, the whole arms-bearing population of Braintree did not exceed 475 at the outside.

poor. It seemed as though the war would never end; not a few were forward to express the wish that it had never begun. longed for quiet and the flesh-pots.

was given them; and now another call is made upon us. one will go without a large bounty, though only for two months, and each town seems to think its honor engaged in outbidding the others. In addition to that, this town voted to make it up six pounds. They then drew out the persons most unlikely to go, and they are obliged to give three pounds to hirea man. Some pay the whole fine, - ten pounds. Forty men are now drafted from this town. More than one-half, from sixteen to fifty, are now in the ser-

It probably fell considerably short of that number. As respects available wealth, it is far more difficult to fix on any safe basis for estimate. This subject has already been considered. It has been stated that the Braintree people during the colonial period had substance, but very little of what would now be called quick capital. In other words, they had nothing which could readily be turned into money. They owned the houses in which they lived, their farms, farm buildings, and stock. They had clothes and A few had money out at interest ; and others were in debt. To this general rule of no available means there were, of course, in an old Such were Col. Quincy, Major Miller, Gen. Palmer, and, possibly, Mr. Thayer. John Adams was not an ex- He had nothing except his house in

The farm his wife tried to manage. Hew men were more capable, and yet in September, 1777, she wrote to him, " Unless you return, what little property you possess will be lost. . . . As to what is here under my immediate inspection, I do the best I can with it. But it will not, at the high price labor is, pay

What was the population of the town during the Revolution ? - and what was its wealth ? of 1765 gives the population at 2433, that of 1776 at 2871, and that of 1790 at 2771. During the war, therefore, taken as one period, Braintree must have numbered a population of close upon 2800 souls. Of useless. As members of a home-guard and during short periods of service, they can be made more or less effective. But the bivouac, long marches, and unaccustomed fare break them down.

make an approximate estimate of the wealth of the town. One part of that farm consisted of thirty-five acres of arable land, with a house, barn, and other

With this part went eighteen acres of Bought in 1774, the cost of the property In 1765 there were 327 houses in Braintree, occupied by 357 families. At the time of the war the number of houses may have increased to 400. That bought by John Adams was one of the better sort. Judging by the sum paid for it, an estimate of $300 to a house and a family would seem to be liberal, for in the town there were some paupers aud many poor people, who, living The owners of

Such being the strength, - 450 men capable of bearing arms, with an accumulation of $400,000 behind them, - it remains to consider the burden. This is no less difficult correctly to estimate than the other.

least limited by the total resources. In considering, then, the Braintree enlistments, those for short periods must be left out of the account. <A service of one or two days in guarding currency. There was no financial, as there was no military, folly which the New England people did not commit during the Revolution. Throughout they showed that the town-meeting is ill adapted to war. They tried to make patriotism a substitute for the provost-guard. They issued false money. They They mobbed those who preferred not to exchange good merchandise for worthless paper. It was not in them to do what Frederick IT. did in Prussia, - take the men they needed and the agreeable spice of danger, but in no sense was it war. The men engaged in that service were not soldiers. itatus. The shorter enlistments also were of not much

A Mr. Partridge, of Duxbury, one of a committee who waited on Washington in October, 1776, asked him whether enlistments for one year would not suffice. He exclaimed in reply, '" Good God! gentlemen, our cause is ruined if you engage men for only | a year. You must not think of it. If we hope for success we must have men enlisted for the whole term of the war." This course was too Spartan; the weaker, the more wasteful, and more murderous one of short enlistments was pursued.

As regards the actual money contributions of Braintree to the war of independence, the records are suggestive, but exasperatingly vague. They are full of votes alluding to reports and statements at the time made, but since lost. There are almost no exact figures. Even when supplemented by the State archives they fail to piece out the story. One thing is apparent: the zeal of the early 1775 soon vanished. Not only in the years which followed could few recruits be obtained from among the townsmen, but they would not submit to a draft. In September, 1777, and again in June, 1780, the Braintree town-meeting formally voted to indemnify the militia officers for any fine they might incur by omitting to draft men when required so to do by the General Court. Commit- dition in 1776, for the Rhode Island expeditions in 1777 and 1778, and for the Penobscot expedition of 1779; others went down to garrison the castle in the harbor. Furnishing and equipping these men went far toward exhausting the town ; but it was playing at war. It was the three-year Continentals who did the work. They were at Long Island, and they were at Stony Point ; they forced Burgoyne's intrenchments, and captured Rahl's Hessians; they bore the heat of Monmouth, and stormed the redoubt at Yorktown. This was war. The question is always, - How many of these men did the town put into the field? Picnics and summer promenades do not count.

recruits. The poorest and worst material in the community was thus collected together and swept into the ranks. A large portion of the heroes of 76 were men of this stamp. In 1781, for instance, Capt. Joseph Baxter, one of the town recruiting committee, had a long wrangle with the selectmen of Boston over ton agents had given him fifteen guineas, and Capt. Baxter '' was drove to the utmost extremity to prove the justness of his claim to said Williams, but finally obtained him." The records of the year 1780 indicate the most severe stress. They read as follows, the meeting being held in the Middle Precinct meetinghouse on the 27th of June. The motion was

Bounty, also Half a Bushel of Corn for Every Day from the Time they march to the time they are discharged or leave the army; and also half a bushel of Corn for every Twenty miles they shall be from home when discharged ; and also month promised by the State, in hard money, if the soldiers enable the town to Receive the said 40/ from the State. Unless it will best sute the soldiers to Receive it from the State themselves.

"Voted, The Selectmen should give Security to the persons that shall engage pursuant to the foregoing vote; and also the Selectmen Procure the Corn at Harvest, and Store it for the men until they return.

" General Palmer generously gave into the hands of the moderator One Thousand and Eighty Dollars, to be equally divided among the thirty-six men that shall first engage in the six months' service as a Reinforcement to the Continental Army. For which the thanks of the Town were voted him.

"The Familys of such men as shall engage for the Term of six months shall be supply'd by the Selectmen with Corn, wood, or such other articles as they stand in need of, which is to be charged and Reducted from the wages of that person, which is to be paid him in Corn upon his Returning home."

At an adjourned meeting held the next day it was further voted to exempt from tax all notes issued by the town for money loaned it to procure men. Two

"The Committee Reported that they had Inlisted thirty-one men, and that there was a prospect of Inlisting the other five men which is wanting to complete the first 36 men called for, and likewise a part or all the nine men Required.

each officer that shall go from this Town for the three months' service Four Hundred Dollars, being the same sum as was voted the soldiers as a Bounty; also Voted the officers the same pay from the town, Exclusive of their other pay, as the Soldiers receive. Cap. Newcomb appeared to go upon the encouragement."

The calls for men were incessant until 1782. A new crop of fighting material had then matured, for the boy not yet twelve when the skirmish at Concord bridge took place was eighteen at the surrender of Yorktown. Between 1775 and 1782, as nearly as can now be estimated, Braintree sent into the field about 550 men, enlisted for periods of six months or town sent not less than 150 men, enlisted to the close of the year, into Washington's army about Boston. In 1776 about 120 men were furnished. In 1777 some seventy were enlisted for three years. In no year were less than forty sent, except in 1781, when the enlistment appears to have been for four months only. Under this system the same men in the course of a sevenyears' war may have enlisted several times. It is im- in the Continental army, though it is probably safe to say that the number did not fall below 300. For shorter terms and in the militia every man in town capable of bearing them bore arms. The average force of Continentals which the town kept in the field would seem to have been about seventy men. There is no record of the number of those who were wounded, or who died in battle or in camp. Neither do the figures which have been given Indeed, it is only through incidental mention in the letters of Mrs. Adams that we even know that privateering was all the rage among the young men of Braintree. Yet not only did she so describe it in 1776, but five years later, in December, 1781, she sent to her husband at the Hague the names of no less than twelve

"Ned Savil," "Job Field," and '"' Josiah Bass" were unmistakable North Precinct names, and doubtless many score of others saw service Nor was it a service lightly to be spoken of. The supplies and munitions of war picked

So far, therefore, as men were concerned, it seems probable that the Revolutionary land and sea service combined kept at least a fourth part of the effective arms-bearing force of Braintree continually employed from 1775 to 1782. They were drawn away from all peaceful occupations, and, in place of being producers, they became consumers. What the consumption of the war amounted to now remains to be considered. During the three years prior to Lexington and Concord - that is, between 1772 and 1774 - Braintree vincial money, or $500, to meet current town expenses ; the precinct or church levy being a distinct In 1776 the sum of £1176 was raised under This, too, was in hard money, only five shillings a bushel, its ordinary price being four shillings ; but rye had doubled, selling for twelve shillings, while ram had gone up from three to eight shillings, and molasses was not to be had. 1778, the sum of £4000 was ordered to be assessed immediately, for in April a requisition in kind of shirts, shoes, and stockings had been made on the town. <A similar requisition for blankets had been made in January, 1777. requisition of shirts, shoes, and stockings was made, the town to furnish "a number of these articles equal to one-seventh Part of the Male Inhabitants levy of £6000 was voted "toward defraying the charges of the same." The currency was now fast losing its value, - how fast may be inferred from the fact that in place of the former allowance of two pence a head for killing old blackbirds, in May, 1780, the sum of thirty shillings was voted, while the three shillings a day for labor on the highways so as to be prepared to give those who enlisted half In July a requisition came for shirts, shoes, stockings, and blankets, and another for horses; in September a third for 23,400 pounds of beef, and in December yet a fourth for 44,933 additional pounds of. beef.

In view of these requisitions in kind, and the utter confusion of the currency, it is impossible to say what the real money cost of the Revolution was. When peace at last came Braintree was heavily in debt. But its notes had shared the fate of the paper currencies in which they were payable. Some of them were paid; some were compromised; some were repudiated. The annual tax levy, which before the war was only £150, after it became £1000.

Fortunately there were in those days few who lived on fixed incomes. Indeed, the minister was almost the only such person who could be sug- All others were dependent on their labor Taxes and the increased price of labor more than used up the whole During the entire Revolutionary period the people were eating into their accumulated substance. Braintree, it has been seen, kept an average of seventy men in the Continental army, besides militia, and practically, of course, had to pay and supply them. This could not have been done at less than three shillings per day for each Consequently, at the lowest computation, the war of independence could not have cost the inhabitants of Braintree less than $100,000 in money.

It has been seen that $100,000 was probably equivalent to at least one-fourth part of the entire accumulation since the settlement of the town. That onefourth part of the whole substance of the community should have been thus consumed in distant military whether he will lend the Town a sum of hard money." He apparently did so; though exactly how it was used or what became of it was subsequently a matter of curious inquiry and repeated investigation.

In 1781 the sum of £1400 in specie was raised, and the town as usual was called on for beef and clothing in kind. but the requisitions for men and supplies still came In March, 1783, the old record-book, which had served for fifty-two years, was full, and when he which nerved the patriot side. tion was not yet so large as before, in 1776, pression followed the return had indeed been great and the loss of men and means oppressive; but none the less Braintree had

The military contribution of Braintree to the war of independence was limited to men and supplies. She furnished no officer who rose to high command, or evinced marked soldierly qualities. Deacon Joseph Palmer was commissioned brigadier-general, but, though a man of active nature and full of enterprise of a certain sort, Palmer was then sixty years of age. His campaigning days were past. Full of zeal, he was at Bunker Hill, and subsequently very active during the siege of Boston, but his largest contingent in the unfortunate " secret expedition" of September, 1777, planned to drive the British from Rhode Island. It is claimed that the wretched failure | of the expedition was not to be laid at Gen. Palmer's door; but Mrs. Adams could not refrain from saying in a letter to her husband, - "'I know you will be mortified, but if you want your arms crowned with victory, you should not appoint what Gen. Gates | calls dreaming deacons to conduct them." |

During the later years of the struggle John Adams was absent from the country. In November, 1777, he had come home and then, while still at | Braintree, been selected to represent the Congress in Europe. frigate '"' Boston" reported in Boston Harbor to carry |

Nantasket Roads. On the morning of the 13th, Mr. | Adams left bis house at Penn's Hill, and accom- | panied by his son John Quincy, now a boy of ten, drove down to Norton Quincy's, at Mount Wol- His wife did | not accompany him; most probably she did not feel to the beach. In it was Captain Tucker, of the | " Boston." Coming up to the house he joined Mr. Adams, who, after writing a few hurried lines to his wife, walked down to the shore, and, bidding good-by to Norton Quincy, the party was rowed across the have cast homesick glances back to it; for it was midwinter, and the British were masters of the sea. But | " Johnny," his father wrote, behaved 'like a man." | Mr. Adams returned home the next year, reaching | Braintree on the 2d of September. <A week later a town-meeting was held for the purpose, among other things, of choosing delegates to the convention which |

While yet engaged in the work of drafting the Constitution Mr. Adams was again sent abroad, and left Braintree on the 13th of November. On the 22d of | the following May " the freeholders and other inhabitants of Braintree qualified to vote in the choice of a Representative' - so the record ran - met in | the Middle Precinct meeting-house and made choice of Richard Cranch to the General Court ; at the same time "the male Inhabitants of said Town of the age the convention. '' The Form being Read, The Town thought proper to choose a Committee to take the same under consideration and Report upon the adjournment."' A committee of fifteen was accordingly selected, with Gen. Palmer at its head. This was by no means the first time in recent years that the inhabitants of Braintree had met to consider questions manner in which they uniformly approached the sub- They seemed fully impressed with its importance. In February, 1778, the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union then drawn up by the Continental Congress had been submitted. The Braintree record states that in the town-meeting these adoption. It was provided in the Articles of Confederation that Congress should "have the sole and exclusive right and power of determining on peace or war." For this necessary provision the town of Braintree formally submitted the following absurd substitute: "The United States in Congress Assembled

At this same time the General Court submitted a draft of a State Constitution which had been prepared by it for approval by the people. It was considered in a Braintree town-meeting held on the 135th of April. Having been read, it was referred to a committee of fifteen to take the same " under Consideration and Report upon the adjournment." - Capt. Peter B. Adams, a younger brother of John, was chairman of this committee. A month later it reported that those composing it "did not approve" of the proposed government, and "it being put to the members present, thirteen was in favor of the form, seventy-four against it."

Gen. Palmer's committee had the Constitution of 1780 under consideration for two weeks. It then reported "sum alterations and amendments, which being read to the Town was Voted and axcepted." Gen. Palmer was then chosen a delegate, in place of John Adams, to attend the convention which was to perfect the draft. The first election under the Constitution was held on the 4th of the following September, and

The utmost discontent prevailed, and an inferior set of political leaders made their appearance. It was the Yet, so far as the record shows, the town of Braintree had The regular town-meeting was held, and the usual action | taken at it. The great question of the day related to finances. The valuation for work done on the highways had fallen from £7 10s. a day in 1780 to three shillings now, and in the collection of taxes a dollar in silver was ordered to be accepted in lieu of $120 in Continental | currency.

The schools had been reopened, and though the Committee of Safety was still in existence, - its work had ceased. But there was one subject, be- | sides the town debts and the badness of the times, The General Court | had passed an act determining the legal limits of the | Sabbath. Accordingly the warrant for the March meeting of 1783 contained an article " that the town may advise thereon and act as they shall think most agreeable to the Sacred Law of God." When the meeting had assembled, Deacon Holbrook, of the Middle Precinct, was chosen moderator, and a vote was passed " that it should be deemed a disorder for any person to go upon the seats in the meeting-house with their feet." Day was referred to a committee of seven, of which after two readings, was accepted and approved. extract can do justice to it. town-meeting upon a solemn legislative act, it is | unique and characteristic : natural day out of seven for himself, which (according to the sacred Scriptures and the confesion of the most Learned part of the world) consists of twenty-four hours, wherein all our secular consearns ought in the most desent and devout manner be folded up to give way to the more important service of divine worship and adoration, and all our Laws and conceits of things ought to be regulated by scripture and not according to the Phil- of man, and when the Laws of any Kingdom or State co-operate with and areagreeable to the Commands of the great Law giver, then and only then may such communetees expect to enjoy divine favours and blessings, prosperity in this and eternal happiness in a future state of existance; your Committee acknowledge it was surprizeing to them that our honourable Court should at this day when we are just amerging from the horrors of a most barbarous and unparraled war curtail a part of the forth Commendment by tolerating secular concerns or servile Labour to be carried on six hours of the same to the great disturbance of every sober and Consciencious Person in this State for no other Reasons saith the Honourable Court than that because their are defirant opinions among the sober and Consciencious Persons of the same Concerning the commencement of the sabath and lest they should be thought to lay unnecessary restrictions on the subject.

'A very slender excuse indeed to whom ought we to hearken to the Great Governor of the world or to the Voice of the sober and consciencious People, a semmilar excuse once was given by a King of Gods antient People for his disobedience of a special command because he feared the people but the inspired Profits Introgative was hath the Lord as great dilght in burn offerings and sacrifice as in obeying the Voice of the Lord behold to obey it better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of Rambs. We cannot conceive that the diference of opinion or the fear of the People ought to cause an abolition of that sacred command ye fourth Commandment but that it ought to have it due extent at one end or the other, perhaps in some future day this sober and Consciencious party may request an other part of six hours more to be abolished and so on, untill that Great and most In- of men, but by the Law of the State, to draw to a close in as concise a manner as a thing of so great weight and Importance will admit of your Committee are of opinion that a Remonstrance be preferred to the aforesaid honourable Court when assembled that there may bea revision of and amendment of the above cited Law that their be no part of the fourth Commandment abolished by Law but that it may have its full extent as revealed to us in the Sacred Scriptures that thereby the Blessings of him who hath ever held an holy jealousy over his Sabath may decend on this Continent and on every State of the same is the sincere wish of your Committee."

The next formal instructions approved by the town were three years later, when, in the summer of 1786, the State was seething with that spirit of discontent which a few months afterwards culminated in Shay's rebellion.