Watertown City (part 1 of 5)

Watertown City

Indians came aud stood at a distance off looking at us but came not near us. But when they iiad been a wliile in view some of them came and held out a great bass towards us, so we sent a man witli a biscuit and changed the cake for a bass. Afterwards they supplied us with bass, exchanging a bass for a biscuit cake and were very friendly unto

(although by our dilligence we had got up a kind of shelter to save our goods in) but we had orders to come away from that place whicli was about Watertown, unto a place called Mattapan near Dorchester. So we removed and came to Mattapan."

The uneventful annals of the town record the peaceful progress of an agriculturnl community occupied in drawing its needful supplies of food from the soil and from the river, and occasionally sending its little colonies to the Connecticut valley, the "far west" of that day. Undisturbed by tlie terrible Indian war that in 1675 devastated so many thriving New England villages, and untroubled by the , whirlwind of superstition that culminated in tiie Salem tragedy of 1692, singularly free from these and other calamities that befell less favored localities, Watertown yet bore lier full share in the efforts and in the burdens of tiie colony in its struggles, first for existence, and subsequently for independence. For more than lialf a century she was preserved from mentfll stagnation by an acrimonious dispute over the question of the proper location of a new meeting-house.

A striking contrast to the simple lives of these Puritan emigrants is afforded by those of their descendants of to-day. Religion furnished not only tiieir spiritual food, but intellectual recreation as well. The two Sunday services, tiie weekly lecture, and the family devotions, filled the place now occupied by the newspaper, the public library, the lyceum, public amusements, and the other manifold methods of employing spare time. Books were scarce and highly prized, and - the Bible excepted - consisted principally of treatises by the Puritan divines. Without being superstitious, they saw a providential significance in the most trivial occurrences. Thus at Watertown, one day (so Governor Winthrop tells us), "many persons saw a great contest between a mouse and a snake. After a long fight the mouse prevailed, and killed the snake. The Eev. Mr. Wilson of Boston, a very sincere and holy man, gave this interpretation of it : the snake was the devil : the mouse was a

Tliere was much sickness duiing the first winter, which was one of great severity, and also much suffering from scarcity of food, many being compelled to subsist solely upon shell-fish, groundnuts, and acorns. Several of the settlers lost their houses and wigwams by fire, and Rev. Mr. Phillips and others had their hay burnt. The settlers were also greatly annoyed by wolves, and one night, the report of a musket discharged at them in Watertown having been heard at Roxbury, the people there, apprehending an Indian attack, were greatly excited, and were called to arms by beat of drum. The alarm was communicated to the people of Boston, who also turned out, but who, on learm'ng the cause, were greatly relieved, and " went merrily to breakfast," says the narrator of the incident.

A site for a fortified town and for a capital of the colony having been selected by Governor Winthrop and the assistants in December, 1030, the settlement of IVewtown (now Cambridge) was beuuu between Chariest own and Watertown. The territory of tliese towns, then undefined, was contiguous, and embraced all that is now included in Cambridge, Arlington, Belmont, Lexington, and Somerville. That between Charles River and Roxbury, and extending from the Back Bay to the southwest, belonged to Boston and Watertown. Between the hue of Newtown and Sir R. Saltonstall's homestead there was oidy one small intervening lot, and it is probable that a number of his companions found themselves included in the limits of the new settlement. The boundary between Watertown and Newtown was established by the General Court April 7, 1G35.

The town, as well as the colony, suffered a great loss in the spring of 1681, when Sir Richard Saltonstall returned to England, leaving his two eldest sons to manage his affairs. His is one of the first among the great names on the roll of the founders of New England, conspicuous alike for sound judgment, public spirit, humane and liberal views, and for social and personal worth. He was the son of Samuel, and nephew of Sir Richard Saltonstall. Lord Mayor of London in 1597, and was bom at Huntwicke, in the West Riding of York, England, in 1586. He was a justice of the peace and lord of the manor of Ledsham, near Leeds, when, in 1628, he became one of the Massachusetts Bay Company, in whose charter he was the first named of the eighteen assistants, lie was a prominent advocate of the transfer of the government of the company from England to tlie colony, and took a leading part in its transactions prior to the emigration. After his return he became one of tlie patentees of Connecticut, and was active in promoting its settlement. He continued to manifest his interest in both colonies by befriending them on various occasions, tliwarting the machinations against them by his influence at court. In 1644 he was ambassador to Holland, wliere his portrait was painted by Rembrandt. In 164-9 he was one of tiie High Court of Justice appointed to try the Duke of Hamilton, Lord Capel, tlie Earl of Holland, and Sir John Owen for high treason. His death occurred in 1638. A long line of distinguished descendants has illustrated the name of Saltonstall in New England down to the present day.

Saltonstall's letter of rebuke to the ministers of Boston has been well characterized as " a noble testimony to his charitable and Christian feelings," w hich were in advance of the age. In it he says, " It dotii not a little grieve my spirit to hear what sadd things are reported daily of your tyranny and persecutions in New England as that you fyne, whip and imprison men for their consciences." He goes on to say, that to comp(4 such men to come into their assemblies as they know will not join in their worship, and then to punish them for showing their dislike of it, is to make them hypocrites and sinners, " conforming in their outward man for fear of punishment. These rigid ways," he adds, " have laid you very low in the hearts of the sayiits. We pray for you and wish you prosperitie every way and not to practice those courses in a wiideriK'ss which you went so far to prevent. .... 1 h(i])c you doe not assume to yourselves iiifalliliililie of judgment when the most learned (if I he apostles confessed he knew but in part and s:i\v hut darkly, as through a glass. Oh that all ihosi' wlio are brctliren though yet they cannot speak and think the same things might bo of one accord in tin- l.urd ! .... The Ijord give you nieeke and huiidile spirits, and not to strive so

W'liliilown was probably one of the Indian settlnniiils of the bay depopulated by the terrible potilence of 1G17. Its advantages for planting, beaver-hunting, and especially for fishing, could not have been overlooked bv the natives, and at

Nonantum, on the other side of the river, they were quite numerous. March 6, 1630-31, upon a complaint made by sagamores John and Peter for the burning of two wigwams which, upon examination, appeared to have been occasioned by James Woodward, servant of Sir Eichard Saltonstall, it was therefore ordered " that Sir Richard should satisfie the Indians for the wrong done to tiiem, which accordingly he did by giving them seven yards of cloth." September 4, 1632, the Court ordered a severe penalty to be inflicted on Richard Hopkins for selling guns, powder, and shot to the Indians. At a (ieiieral I'ourt, September 6, 163S, " It was agreed that the Court of Assistants should take order for the Indians that they may have satisfaction for their right at Lynn and Watertown." In March following the Court desired Mr. Gibbens " to agree with the Indians for the land within the bounds of Watertown, Cambridge, and Boston," for which £23 8«. %d. was paid them in May, 1640, by the two former towns; Cambridge also " to give Squa Sachem a coat every winter while she liveth." This Indian queen was the widow of Nanepashemit. The Massachusetts settlers were scrupulously carefid to ])ay the Indians for their lands, and to deal justly with them on all occasions.

The earliest existing records of the town bear date in 1634, four years after its settlement, and in the same year tiiat the creation of a house of deputies, or representatives, wrouglit a most important change in the government of the colony. At the same time that the people began to be represented in the colonial government they also, "for the ordering of the civil affairs of the town," intrusted them to that peculiarly New England institution, a board of selectmen, annually chosen by the freemen. The three Watertown men first chosen to this board, one of whom was to serve as town-clerk, were William Jennison, Brian Pendleton, and .lohn K.ldie.

\Vh;.l h'd lo this improved method of administnition was an cnl.T of the eourl, dated February 3, It;.-;] -3:2, llul I 110 be levicl of the several planlaliiins Icnviiids making a ]);disade about the \c\\ Idwn." When the warrant for .£8, its proportion (if that lax, i-eiiehed Watertown, "the pastor (Mr. l'hillip-^1 and elder (Mr. Richard Browne) assembled the people and delivered their opinions that it was not safe to pay moneys after that sort, for fear of bringiTig themselves and their posterity into bondage." Their o))position was lawful and proper, as the clmrter, so far from authorizing tiie assistants to tax all persons living on the company's lands, did not even empower them to assess the freemen. Summoned before tlie governor and assistants on the 17th of the same month, there was " much debate," but being " the weaker party," tliey were compelled, says Winthrop, " to make a retraction and submission." In view of the result of this contention it seems altogether unlikely that any retraction was made ; at any rate, Watertown has reason to be proud of her defence of tiie great principle of no taxation without representation, for, only three months afterwr.rd, at the very next meeting of the court, a committee of two was appointed from each town to confer with tiie court about raising "a public stock [treasury]," and thus the popular representative body of the colony originated, and thus the trading corporation unconsciously became a representative democracy. The names of John Oldham and John Masters stand first on this committee ; while those of Robert Feake, Richard Browne, and John Oldham appear as the delegates from Watertown to the first General Court, held May 14, 163-t.

At a court of assistants, April 12, 1631, a watch to begin at sunset was ordered at Dorchester and at "Watertown, and " if any person shall shoot off a piece after the watch is set he shall forfeit 40 «. or be whipped." In May, 1634, this watch was reduced from four to two, and on March 9, 1636-37, wards were also to be kept on the " Lords Days " and every person above the age of eighteen (except magistrates and elders of churches) " shall be compellable to this service." Every town was at the same time ordered to have a watch-house. The meeting-house was sometimes used as a watchhouse, and also as the depositary of the ammunition of the town. In 1711 the old school-house on School-house Hill was ordered to be repaired for a watch-house. In 1639 the town was fined for not having a pair of stocks, and ordered to procure one.

In the early days great importance was attached to the performance of the duties of citizenship. In 1639 it was ordered that any duly warned freeman absent from a town-meeting should be fined 2«. 6^/., a penalty afterwards increased to 5«. A selectman absent from the place of meeting " past 9 of the clock in the forenoon " also forfeited %s. Qd. to the town. One of the duties of the selectmen was to take turns, "every man his day to site upon the gallery to look to the youths that they may prevent miscarriages in the time of public services on the Lord's Day." They were also to take notice of "sundry persons in this towne who are in their habits contrary to the law concerning the excess of apparell," and to see that none " except such as the law doth allow, do either wear silke goods or silke scarfes, gould or silver lace, or buttons, ribbons at knees or trassed handkerchiefs, upon the ferfeiture of what penalty the law doth apoynt which is, that they shall be rated in the country rate after £200 in the same." Among the early enactments of the town was one offering a reward of 5*. for each wolf killed in the town ; another affixing a penalty upon whoever " should suffer his dog to come to the meeting upon the Lord's Day "; and that ordering that the two fairs at Watertown, " the one upon the first Friday of the 4th month ; the other upon the first Friday of the 7th month shall be kept upon the trayning place."

At the second meeting of the governor and assistants September 7, 1630, precautions were taken in anticipation of Indian attacks, and provision was made for the support of Captain Daniel Patrick of Watertown, and Captain John Underbill of Boston, both of whom had served in tiie Low Countries, as instructors in the military art. Tiie latter had the training of the soldiers on the south side of Charles River, while Patrick had charge of those on the north side, at Charlestown, Watertown, Newtown, and Medford, the men of the two former towns training together until 1635.

It seems probable that the settlers of Watertown were more numerous than those of the other towns planted in 1630, and that this superiority of numbers was maintained for twenty years. The apportionment of the early tax levies indicates this. Her people, like those of Roxbury, soon began to be overcrowded, and to disperse either to form new plantations, or to go to other towns already settled. In August, 1635, it was "agreed by the consent of the freemen (in consideration there be too many inhabitants in the town, and the town thereby in danger to be ruinated) tiiat no forrainer coming into tiie town, or any family among ourselves shall have any benefit of commonage or land undivided, but what they shall ])urchase, except that tiiey buy a man's riglit wiiolly in the town." It was further agreed, " that, whosoever being an inhabitant in the town shall receive any person or family upon their propriety that may prove chargeable to the town shall maintain the

Wethersfield, the oldest town in Connecticut, received from Watertown its first considerable emigration in 1634. Pyqnag, its Indian name, was changed in 1635 to Watertowii, and later to Wethersfield. Some of this colony were afterwards among the first settlers of Stamford, Milford, and Brantbrd. May 29, 1635, the following Watertown men .went to Wethersfield : Rev. Richard Denton, Robert Reynolds, John Strickland, Jonas Weede, Rev. John Sherman, Robert Coe, and Andrew Ward. The two latter afterwards settled in Stamford. Leonard Chester, John Finch, Nathaniel Foote, John Oldham, Edward Pierre, John Reynolds, and Robert Rose went before 1 612.

In 1636 Dedham was largely settled from Watertown, and in the same year some of her peo])le were among the settlers of Concord. Sudbury was the next town planted by Watertown, the court, in November, 1637, "in regard of their straitness of accommodation and want of meadow," giving them leave upon their petition " to remove and settle a plantation upon the river which runs to Concord." Martha's Vineyard was first planted by a Watertown colony led by Thomas Mayhew in 1642, and her sons were the pioneers in the settlement of Ijancaster, Groton, Framingham, Shrewsbury, Worcester, Rutland, and Spencer, as also of many of (he towns in southern and eastern Connecticut, and on Long Island. Emigrants from Watertown are found among the early settlers of nearly all of the towns in Middlesex County.

The earliest list of the iidiabitants of Watertown is dated July 25, 1C36. It is "a grant of the Great Dividends [allotted] to the freemen [and] to all the townsmen then inhabiting, being 120 in number."

The war ending in the extinction of the warlike Pequot tribe in 1637 was caused by the murder of John Oldham, a highly respected citizen of Watertown, its deputy to the first General Court, and a member of its church, while trading at Block Island, July 20, 1636. Immediately afterward John Gallup, in a larger vessel, with a crew consisting of one man and two boys, seeing Oldham's pinnace in the possession of Indians, ran into her with such force as nearly to overset her. Six of the Indians jumped overboard and were drowned. Repeating the mancEuvre a second and a third time, the remaining Indians were either drowned or taken, and two boys who had accompanied Oldham were rescued uninjured. This is the first American sea-fight on record.

Ensign William Jeiniison, one of the four officers in command of the expedition to Block Island in the following autumn, "to do justice to the Indians for the murder of Mr. Oldham," was, in March, 1637, chosen first captain of the train-band of Watertown. He was a man of capacity and integrity, and was almost constantly in the public service. All the able-bodied men of the colony were, in December, 1636, arranged in three regiments, those of the districts now included in the counties of Suffolk, Essex, and Middlesex. Of the latter, which then included Cliarlestown, Newtown, Watertown,

! Concord, and Dedham, John Haines was colonel, Roger Harlakenden lieutenant-colonel, and Captain Patrick muster-master. Watertown raised fourteen of the one hundred and sixty men levied for the Pequot War, in April, 1637, and the first forty Massachusetts levies marched under Captain Patrick. Lieutenant Robert Seeley, a Watertown man who had removed to Connecticut, was second in command to Captain John Mason in the famous fight and destruction of the Pequot stronghold.

From November 28, 1613, to November 9, 1617, the records of the town are .lost. Records of marriages, births, and deaths were ordered by the court in September, 1639, to be kept, and June 11, 1613, they appointed a "clerk of the writs" to ])crform the service. The first of these officers in Watertown was Simon Eire. The earliest marriage on the record is that of John Bigelow and Mary AVarren, in 1642, "before Mr. Nowell." Marriage, then regarded as a civil contract, was for a long time performed only by magistrates or specially authorized persons. The earliest record of a marriage here by a clergyman was that by Rev. Jolm Bailey, August 10, 1686. For fifteen years after John Saltonstall's departure, and until Mr. Richard Browne was autiiorized to perform the ceremony, the people of the town, being without a magistrate, were obliged to apply to magistrates of other towns to be married.

The apostle Eliot began his missionary labors among the Indians " near Watertown Mill, upon the south side of Charles River," in October, 1616. This is not the place in which to enlarge upon this subject, nor can we know how much interest the people of Watertown took in this pious but futile effort to Christianize the heathen around them, but to us it seems one of the most picturesque and memorable incidents in our early history. Five years later the Indian church and village of Natick were founded by Eliot.

One of the earliest of the executions in New England for witchcraft took place about 1650, when a Mrs. Kendall of Cambridge was judicially murdered for bewitching to death a cliild of Goodman Cannings (Jennison) of Watertown. The princijjal evidence was that of a Watertown nurse, who testified that the said Kendall did make much of the child, and then the child was well, but quickly changed in color and died a few hours after. After the execution the parents denied that their child was bewitched, and stated that it died from imprudent exposure to cold by the nurse the

In the formidable Indian outbreak of 1675-76, known as Philip's War, wliich threatened the destruction of the New England colonies, thirteen towns were destroyed and more than si.\ hundred men, chieHy young men, the flower of the country, perished in the field. Watertown escaped, but her citizens were repeatedly called out to re])el the onslaught of the savages upon neighboring towns. Tiie following names of twenty " souldiers," impressed from "Watertown in November, 1675, for the defence of the colony, were returned by Captain Hugh Mason as " rationaly most fit to goe upon the servis " : "Daniell Warrin, Sr., John Bigulah, Sr., Nathaniel Hely, Joseph Tayntor, John Whitney, Sr., George Harrington, William Hagar, Jr., John Parkhurst, Michael Flagg, Jacob Bullard, Isaac Learned, Joseph Waight, George Dill, William Pierce, Nathaniel Sanger, Moses Whitney, Joliti Wiiidam, Joseph Smith, Nathaniel Barshani, John Barnard."

The brave Captain Beers, of Watertown, while marching from Hadley to bring off the garrison at Scjuakheag (Northfield), was, on the morning of September 4, 1675, waylaid by the Indians and slain, together with about twenty of his men. The scene of the conflict is to this day called Beers' Plain, and the eminence to which he withdrew his men and where he fell is still known as Beers' Mountain. Richard Beers came to Watertown in 16;50. He was a soldier in the Pecpiot War, participating, as he himself says, "in two several designs when the Lord delivered them into our Jiands." ,S(i(in after, or, as he says, " Uppou his return, such a weakness fell uppon his body that for 8 years space he was much disiiiabled to labor for his famyly, spending a great part of that little he had upon piiesitions." Ilr was a sergeant in 16f2, when the court ordcivd him to superintend "the breeding of saltpetre." Ilis homeslead, where in 16.") he was lircnsrd to kc'i) an ordinary, was on I Til 1661. he p. colony " whri' seeing lie h;i same and lull

Captain Hugh ilason, who at the head of forty Watertown men marched to the relief of Groton, was, March 15, 1676, appointed one of a committee of four to provide for the defence of the frontier towns of Middlesex County. April 20, his men assisted the inhabitants of Sudbury to repulse the attack of two hundred Indians, whom they drove across the river. Next day they followed them and renewed the attack in the hope of aflbrding relief to Captain Wadsworth, but there being " too many" of them, our men, who were almost surrounded, retriafcd lo Captain Goodnow's garrison. Some (if W ;i(ls\\uiiirs men who had taken refuge in Noyes' Mill were rescued by Mason, who, joining Captain Hunting's com])any, went over tiie river, gathered the slain of Wadsworth's and Brocklebank's companies, and buried them. This was PJiilip's last success, and he was soon afterwards hunted down and killed. Captain ilason was seventy-six years of age at this time. He was one of the original settlers of the town, and had been a representative and selectman for many years. He was chosen captain in 1652. It is conjectured that he was the brother of tiie distinguished Captain John ilason of Connecticut.

Some of tlie Watertown men wlio fell in the wars with the Indians were : William Flagg, at Lancaster, August 22, 1675; John Chinery, at Northfield, September 4, 1675 ; John Ball, at Lancaster, Septrmber 10, 1675; Sherman, Jr., son of Captain Juliii, at llie .Xarragansett Fight; George llarnngtdii oF Wadswonirs cimipaiiy, at Lancaster, February, 1676; Liniicnaiit (niximm Flagg, at Lamprey River, July d, Ki'.Hi, miil Niigeant Jacob Fulham, at Lovewell's Pond, May 8, 1725.

Watertow-n's proportion of the tax for the carrying on the war against Philip was £45. January 22, 1677, the government made allowance to the jjeople distressed by the war, and allotted to the selectmen of the several towns their projiortion out of the "Irish Charity" in meal, oatmeal, wheat, malt at IS.v., butter per ball (ir/., and clicese 1^/. per pound. Nineteen Watevlowii families, (-(insisting of seventy-six j)ersons, were thus aided, lioston and Charles'town being alone entitled K, a hirger measure of relief.

Ill 1727 tlie sdldiers who were in the Narragansett e\]iedition ill 1675, or their lawful re|)resentativcs, ]ietitioiied the (ieneral Court for the land promised them when they enlisted. Their petition was granted, and to tlie Watertown men named below was assigned a portion of Township No. 2, now Westminster, Massaclmsetts. They were Jolni Sawin for his fatlier Thomas, Ephraim Cutter, James Cutting for his father James, Jolin Bernard, Joshua Bigelow, Wiiham Shattuck, Joseph Grant for his father Josepli, Zachariah Smith for his father Jonathan, Samuel Hagar for his father John, George Harrington's heirs, John Harrington, Josepli Priest for his father Josepii, Zachariah Cutting, Jolni Bright for his uncle John, George Parmeter for his father William, Joseph Ball for his uncle Jacob Bullard, Thomas Harrington for his wife's fatlier Timotiiy Rice, John Sherman for his uncle John, Captain Josepli Bowman for his wife's uncle James Barnard, Joseph Smith for his father Joseph, Pilchard Beers for his father Elnathan, Michael Flagg's heirs, John Cutting for his father John, the heirs of Dr. Wellington and of Benjamin Wellington.

When, upon the news of the landing of the Prince of Orange in England, the peojjle of Boston and vicinity overthrew the hated government of Andros, representatives from all the towns in the colony met at Boston, May 16S9, to consult as to the propriety of nsiiniiim the (jld charter. William Bond and Benjamin Gartield, on behalf of the people of Watertown, were instructed to maintain "the charter rights," that is, the old charter, and to agree to the declaration set forth at a previous meeting of representatives until further orders from the English government. This course was recommended by a large majority of the towns, but the old charter was never restored, and a new one, less liberal in some respects, was granted by King William III. in 1691.

After the decease of Captain John Sherman in 1691 the town was divided into three military precincts. The first was under Captain William Bond, who was made a magistrate in 16S6 ; the second (Waltham) was Lieutenant Garfield's ; and the third (Weston) was that of Lieutenant Josiah Jones.

The ineffectual attempt to establish three regular market-places in Boston in 1734 gave great offence to the neighboring towns, who regarded tiiis restriction as an infringement of their rights. In retaliation, the people of Watertown voted to suspend all intercourse with the Bostonians at their markets under a heavy penalty, but it is probable that a measure so absurd as that of prohibiting people from selling vegetables where it was for their interest to sell, soon became a dead letter.

In 1 7i)S a company from Watertown and vicinity, commanded by Captain Jonathan Brown, was in service in Canada, in the regiment of Colonel William Williams. Captain Brown was afterwards a member of the Provincial Congress, serving on important committees, and was for many years a selectman.

Watertown, in common with the other towns in the colony, heartily co-ojjerated with Boston in the various measures of the patriot leaders in ojjposition to the arbitrary acts of the British government. That imposing duties on tea, paper, glass, etc., aroused universal indignation. At the meeting held in Boston towards the close of the year 1767, for the encouragement of home productions and to lessen foreign importations, the other towns were appealed to for sympathy and support in this policy. Watertown, January 18, 1768, responded by voting to dispense with imported goods, at the same time declaring all foreign teas expensive and pernicious, as well as unnecessary. " This continent,'^ she said, " abounds with many herbs of a more salubrious cpiality, which, if we were as much used to as the poisonous Bohea, would no doubt in time be as agreeable, perhaps much more so ; and whilst by a manly influence we expect our women to make this sacrifice to the good of their country, we hereby declare we shall highly honor and esteem the encouragers of our own manufactures and the general use of tiie productions of tills continent, this being in our judgment at this time a necessary means, under God, of rendering us a happy and free people.'^

Thus it appears tiiat almost six years before tlie tea was thrown into Boston Harbor it iiad been tiirown overboard, metaphorically, by Watertown, which took the lead in denouncing this " expensive, pernicious, and poisonous " herb.

At the same meeting her representative was instructed, while resisting all encroachments upon her rights and joining in all vigorous but legal and peaceable measures for obtaining relief, "not to be drawn into any rash or disorderly measures, either disrespectful to the best of sovereigns, or nndutiful to our mother country," thus indicating how far they then were from any thought of renouncing allegiance to Great Britain. The circular of tile Boston Committee of Correspondence, issued in November, 1773, enumerating the wrongs and grievances inflicted by the British Parliament, and calling upon tiie people to be watchful, was answered bv the AVatertown committee, February 5,

The sentiments of the inhabitants upon the destruction of the tea in Boston Harbor found expression in the spirited resolves and preamble of the town-meeting of January '6, 1774. "We are fully of opinion," say they, " that the i)eople had no design or desire that the tea on board the vessels should be destroyed or any way damaged but, on the contrary, were very desirous and used their utmost endeavors that said tea might be safely returned to the owners thereof." The accompanying resolves proscribe with all possible strength of expression the use of tea in any mode or quantity.

As early as May, 1774, just before the closing of the port of Boston, the selectmen - Samuel ^Vllite, David Bemis, Josiah Capen, David Sanger, and .Elijah Bond - bought four half-barrels of powder, and proposed to the town the purchase of balls and flints. The committee of correspondence were Samuel Fiske, Moses Stone, Richard Clarke, Jedediah Leathc, and Nathaniel Stone. The town was represented in the Middlesex County Convention, held August 30, 1774, at Concord, which declared its intention to " nullify the late acts of parliament in violation of our rights."

The Revolution was now making rapid progress, and early in September the town ordered that its militia should be exercised two hours every week, and that its stock of arms and ammunition should be inspected. This was followed up by votes instructing its tax-collectors to pay their money into the tri-asury of the town instead of that of the |)i()viiiir; directing their representative. Captain Joiiallian Brown, to unite with those of the other iduiis in forming a i)rovincial congress; ami autlioriziug the mounting and ecpiipping of tlie two pieces of cainioii in tlu; town. November 21, 1771', a cominiltcr of nine was a])pointed to carry into effect the association and resolves of the General Congress at I'hiladcljihia, and likewise those of the Provincial Congress. A iiiiiiute-com])any was formed .Tanuarv t, 177.">, " four roppcrs" (lo br l.iid out for rcfrcslniicnl) ixiiig allowed earli man for his atlendance once a ucck lo learn mililarv exercises. lis olIic.Ts wrrc : ,S;nnucl jianianl, captain ; .lolin St r:,l l.iii, fn-l licuh'u.inl ; I'lunclias Mcani^.s.-coiMJ lici.hnaul; Kduanl liarnii-I.Mi,.! v., .-MMu'n ; SaiMU.l Saiitr.T, Ahiicr Cr.ili, ( Inisloplicr (u-ani, Jr., and J(,.>iali Capcn, Jr., sci-,.nils; Mcplien Whitney, Moses Stone, Jr., Isaac Sanderson^ Jr., and Nathaniel Bright, corporals.

On the morning of the memorable 10th of April, 1775, the Middlesex regiment, under Colonel Thomas Gardner, assembled at the Watertown meeting-house. Michael Jackson, who commanded the Newton compain- that day, and afterwards, as colonel of the Stli Alassachiisitts Regiment, served through the Revolutionary AVar, found, on his arrival at the meeting-house, that the officers were in council in the adjacent school-house. Obtaining the floor, he told them that the time for talking had passed and the time for fighting had come; that if they meant to op])ose the march of the British troops they must forthwith leave the schoolhouse and take up their march for Lexington, and that he intended that his company should take the shortest route to get a shot at the British. His blunt, vigorous speech broke up the council, each company behig left to take its own course. Those of Newton and Watertown, joining near Lexington, eneoiiiilcred Lord Percy's retre.itiiig column, exchanging shots with it, and h.mging upon its flank and rear, until, at nightfall, it reached Charlestown, completely exhausted and demoralized. They received upon the field the thanks of Dr. Warren, president of the Provincial Congress, for their bravery. The Watertown men wen- led that day by Captain, afterwards ^lajor, Samuel Barnard, one of the Boston Tea-Party, losing only one of their number, Joseph Coolidge, in the action.

Three days after the battle the second Provincial Congress adjourned from Concord to Watertown, its sessions and those of the third and last, as well as those of the (ieneral Court, its successor, being held in the old meeting-house until the adjournment of the latter body to the state-house in Boston, November 9, 1770. President Langdon, of Harvard College, preached the Election Sermon before the Congress that assembled here May 31. After the departure of President Hancock, who was a delegate to the congress at Philadelphia, Joseph Warren, the early martyr in the cause of American freedom, ])resi(leil over ils deliberations until the meiiKn'able ITlli of .lune. Before hisdeparlniv for the scene of aclion that day he enlrcated th,' la.lics of the house m uhlchhe boarded to prepare Init and bandages, oh.serx ing, "The i)oor h'llows will ttaiil them all before night."

Street was opened this building had to be removed, and it now stands nearly opposite the in'gli school. These two bodies were kept in a state *of great activity by the extraordinary exigency that had arisen, having in charge not only tlie re-establishment upon an entirely new basis of the civil authority, but also the raising, equipping, and supplying of an army, as well as the general oversight and direction of the military operations of the province. Arms and military stores had been deposited under guard, early in the siege, at the house of Kdward Itichardson, who kept an inn at the iutersectidii iif ISelmont and Mount Auburn streets. Tiie old house is yet standing, and was the residence of the late Mr. Joseph Bird. At the end of April sixteen pieces of cannon belonging to the colony were stored in Watertown.

Even the clergy were carried away by the warlike spirit that pervaded the people. The annual convention of ministers, held in the Watertown church, June 1, 1775, of which Eev. Amos Adams, of Eoxbury, was the scribe, recommended to the people to take up arms, and oU'ered their services, with the consent of their several congregations, to officiate by rotation as chaplains iu the army.

death-wound while leading on his men. Under its major, Michael Jackson, it pressed forward, and pouring a well-directed fire upon the advancing Britons, gallantly covered the retreat. Lieutenant- Colonel William Bond, of Watertown, succeeded to the command, and led his regiment during the siege of Boston and the invasion of Canada.

In an old dilapidated building that stood until recently within the foundry-yard of Miles Pratt & Co., near the bridge. The Boston Gazelle and Conn- (i-ij Jimriud, the leading organ of the patriots, was published from June 5, 1775, to October 2S, 1776, when it was removed to Boston, its original place of issue. Edes, its proprietor, had escaped from Boston in a boat by night, taking with him a press and a few types, with which the Gazette was continued, and was made printer to congress and to the assembly. His paper was distinguished by its spirited and fearless advocacy of the American cause, and obtained a wide popularity.

Washington, then on his way to Cambridge to take command of the army, was met at Sjiriiigfield by a deputation from the Provincial Congress, who attended him, escorted by volunteer companies and cavalcades of gentlemen. July 2, he arrived at Watertown, where he was greeted by congress with a congratulatory address.

The inhabitants of Boston who had taken refuge in Watertown held here several meetings for the transaction of their jjublic business. The anniversary of the 5th of March was duly celebrated by them in 1776, and an oration was delivered by Rev. Peter Thatcher, of Milton.

Captain Edward Harrington died in the service at Ticonderoga, in September, 1776, and during the war many other Watertown men, among whom was Colonel William Bond, died ather from disease in camp, or on the field of battle. Soldiers were raised, to whom liberal bounties were paid, and in general the town co-operated heartily in measures for the common defence. Her citizens. May 20, 177G, unanimously a])proved the Declaration of Independence, declaring they would " stand by and defend the same with their lives and estates"; and on January 17, 1778, her representative was instructed to signify her concurrence in the Articles of Confederation. On account of the prevalence of small-pox in Boston, the legislative session of 1778 was held iu Watertown. At a town-meeting, held May 24, 1779, a large majority voted against the proposed form of state government ; but it had a majority of the votes of the state, and the convention that met in September following framed the present state constitution.

A depreciated currency, the inevitable result of the over-issue of irredeemable paper, caused general alarm and embarrassment, and was erroneously attributed to monopolists. A town-meeting, held July 7, 1779, to remedy the evil, adopted fixed prices for labor and all the important articles of traffic. This was also done in other towns, thus aggravating an evil already sufficiently alarming. The price of labor was fi.xed at 60«. per day ; shoes, £6 per pair; a coat, £8; candles, 8 «. per pound ; milk, 2«. per quart ; barley, £4 10-s. per bushel; shaving, 3.S. ; soap, 10-?. per pound. Those who sold at higher rates were deemed enemies to the country, and were to be " cryed " as such by the townclerk for six months, at every public meeting of the town. In 1781 a poor-house was first established, upon the south bank of the river, above the bridge.

17, 1830. The address delivered by Kev. Convers Francis on this occasion was embodied in his history of the town, published soon afterward. A. centennial celebration was held, July 4, 1876, at Wliite's Hill Grove, and an address was delivered by William H. Ingraham, Esq., president of the day. The oration by Rev. J. F. Lovering contained many interesting passages from the early records of the town.

Between the hours of one and two in the afternoon of .luly 21, 1811, occurred the most destructive fire ever known in Watertown. Originating in the stable of the Spring Hotel, a strong southwest wind communicated the tlames to nearly every building in its range to leeward for nearly a mile. The new and beautiful meeting-house, erected by the First Parisli in 1836, the interior of which was elegantly fitted up, took fire from some sparks that lodged in the upper part of the building, and, together with its valuable organ, was entirely consumed. Besides injuring tJie hotel (which was of brick), the fire destroyed the grocery store of John Clark, the bakery and dwelling of Francis Leathe, John Lenox's barber-shop, and the dwellings of Messrs. Loud, Dana, Stratton, William Sherwin, and Colonel Livermore.

xVt tlie first towu-nu-ctini,' in Watcrtown to act upon matters relatiiii: in the \V,ir of Ihc Kcbcllidii, held April -ll, 1S61 , scvcnd patriotic speeches were made by the clergymen of the town and others, and §5,000 were appropriated to aid in forming a new military organization. The company thus initiated had its full complement of men in one week's time, went into camp at Cambridge July 3, and served through the war as Company K, 16th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers. It left camp August 17, 1861, under Colonel Powell T. Wyman; it was in the campaign before Richmond (losing its colonel at Glcndale), Second Bull Run, Fredericksburg, Cliancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wihh'Mirss, .S|)(ittsylv,iniM, and Petersburg, and has in>ri'ihc(l ii|jiin ils banner the names of twentynine lull le-licl<ls.

A copy of an autograph letter from President Lincoln, acknowledging their receipt and assuring them of his grateful appreciation of their efforts for the health and comfort of the soldiers, was inscribed upon the records of the town.

Ecclesiastical. - Tlie first work of the settlers after providing for themselves a temporary shelter was to combine into church fellowship. On account of the great sickness and mortality prevailing in Ciiarlestown, July 30, 1630, was observed throughout the colony as a day of fasting and prayer. After the close of these exercises at Watertown, as we are told by R«v. Cotton Mather, "about forty men, whereof the first was that excellent Knight, Sir Richard Saltonstall, then subscribed this instrument (a church covenant), in order unto their coalescence into a church estate," and its date, coeval with that of the organization of the Boston church at Ciiarlestown, entitles the Watertown church to rank next after those of Salem and Dorchester.

At the first Court of Assistants, held at Charlestown, priority was given to tlie cpiestion of providing for the ministers. Sir Richard Saltonstall undertook to have a house built at his plantation for Mr. Phillips, and the governor at the other plantation for Mr. Wilson, and a stipend of £30 a year was assigned to each.

A house of worship was probably constructed very soon after the settlement of the town, certainly before 1634. It is supposed to have stood east of Mount Auburn, where Saltonstall, Rev. Mr. Phillips, Elder Richard Browne, and most of the freemen of that date resided. August 7, 1635, a rate of £ 80 was ordered to be levied for the charges of the new meeting-house, which, it is conjectured, was on meeting-house common, near the old graveyard. Dr. Francis says, " It stood on rising ground between the houses of Deacon Coolidge and Daniel Sawin, on the north side of the road to Cambridge. There was a cominou before it which was u.sed as a training-field." It had a bell as early as KilS- 111, and in tlic fnllowiug S.-ptember a levy was made to [jHivide it witii a gallery. Another, built on or near the same spot in 1656, after the pattern of the Cambridge meeting-liouse, eonliniu'd in use for the whole town, including Walt ham and ^Veston, until after the resignation of Mr. Bailey, when a eontrover.sy as to tiie inconvenience of its location resulted in a division of the church and the building of a meeting-house at the southeast corner of what are now Ikdmont and Lexington streets.

In 17^0j soon after the decease of Rev. Mr. Angier, the town, which before the iucorporation of Weston had been divided into tliree precincts, was re-divided into two, witli independent ecclesiastical organizations, each society building its own house. . The West Precinct (Mr. Angler's) purchased tlie old Newton meeting-house in 1721, wiiich they set up a little north of Waltham Plain, near the old Livermore homestead, since known as the Lyman Place. The Eastern Precinct (Mr. Gibbs's) in 17iJ.'3 built their house on School-house Hill, afterwards known as Meeting-house Hill, the ancient Strawberry Hill. This structure gave place to that built at the corner of Mount Auburn and Common streets. In May, 1754, before its completion, the new house was burned to the ground. The historic edifice in. which were held the sessions of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, built on the same spot, was completed in February, 1755. Until lS:i7 this was the only meeting-house in Watertown. It was enlarged in 1819, but was taken down in 1837, a new edifice having been completed and dedicated September 7, 1836. This was destroyed by the great fire of 1841. The present house, erected on the site of the latter, was dedicated August 3, 1842.

The first church of Watertown, organized July 30, 1630, was the only one in the town for sixty-six years. It was the first to adopt independency, to which it adhered for a long time more strictly than did either of tiie otiier churches, standing alone, in this respect at least, until after the arrival of Eev. John Cotton. For more than ten years, and until the ordination as his colleague of Mr. Jolni Knon les, December 9, 1640, Rev. George PhiUips was its sole pastor.

Trouble soon arose in the congregation. In 1631 Elder Richard Browne, the same who afterwards opposed arbitrary taxation, avowed and defended the opinion that the churches of Rome were true churches, a view in which Pastor Pliillips concurred. An idea more repugnant to the zealous Puritan could hardly be imagined, although it seems entirely consistent with the enlarged and liberal mind of Mr. Browne. Governor Winthrop, Deputy- Governor Dudley, and Elder Nowell visited Watertown on two difi'erent occasions, to discuss the startling proposition, and it was declared to be an error. A temporary reconciliation was effected, but Browne was dismissed from office in 1632. Richard Browne had been an officer in a church of Separatists in London. He was one of the first settlers, and was the first ruling elder in the Watertown church. After his dismission his fellowcitizens manifested their esteem by sending him as a commissioner to Wethersfield to heal the distraction in that colony. He was their representative in the first court in 1634, and in most of the subsequent ones until 1657, when he removed to Charlestown, where he died in 1659. He was a man of more than ordinary ability and of marked independence of character. It was Browne's complaint to the assistants that caused them to write to England in disapproval of Endicott's act in cutting the cross from the king's colors, which he argued would be regarded in England as an act of rebellion that would draw down tlie royal displeasure upon the colony.

In 1612 Nathaniel Briscoe, a rich tanner of Watertown, wrote and privately circulated a pamphlet against supporting the ministry by taxation. For this grave offence he was summoned before the court, and, acknowledging his fault, was fined £10. A letter of Briscoe, who had returned in disgust to England, dated London, September 7, 1652, in which he says, " I am partly promised a place in the Tower of £50 per annum, but had we liberty of conscience with you I had rather be there with £20 per annum," fell into the hands of tlie colonial government. As this letter freely censured tlie course of parliament, and as it was at once sent to the speaker of that body with an indorsement by Secretary Rawson and Rev. John Wilson, it is not unlikely that Briscoe's "place in the Tower" was promptly provided. Another example of the means then supposed to be efficacious in the suppression of iieresy was afforded in the case of Jolin Stowers, of Watertown, who in 1643 was fined for reading an Anabaptist book. From all these facts - from the independence of its church, from its opposition to arbitrary taxation, from Saltonstall's manly rebuke of the Boston ministers, and from the outspoken criticisms of Rev. Mr. Phillips, Elder Browne, and others, upon the course of the Puritan government - it is evident tiiat an unusually catholic spirit, as well as just ideas of civil and religious liberty, prevailed among the first settlers of Watertown.

Rev. George Phillips, " a godly man, especially gifted, and very peaceful in his place," was a native of Rainham, in Norfolk, England, and n'as educated at Cambridge, where he received the degree of A. M. in 1617. At the university he was distinguished for piety, talent, and remarkable pro- ficiency in liis studies. He was settled in the ministry at Boxted, in Essex, when persecution drove him to New England, where his wife died soon after their arrival. Mr. Phillips was an able controversialist, and was familiar with the original languages of the Scriptures, which he is said to have read through six times every year. Johnson says, " He was mighty in the Scriptures, and very diligent to search out the mind of Christ therein contained." His views of the Congregational order and discipline, soon universally adopted by that cliurch, were for a time regarded as novel and extreme, and met with much opposition. Possessing great independence and firmness, he was conscientious in forming and fearless in maintaining his opinions. His opposition, with that of Richard Browne, to a tax levied by the governor and assistants, produced a result no less important than the institution of a representative body in the government of the colony. He died July 1, 16M, at the age of fifty-one. There is a tradition that he lived in the house, yet standing, opposite the old burying-ground. This old house, whose solid oaken frame is said to have been brought over by Sir R. Saltonstall, has a projecting second story, partly concealed by a modern pia/za, and stands well back from the street. Externally there is nothing to indicate great age, but its interior retains many marks of antiquity. It formerly had three porticos, which have been removed from its front, and a steep roof, which has given place to one of much less altitude. Mr. Phillips' first residence was burnt in 1630, and this was perhaps the second house built on the parsonage lot. Mr. Phillips's son Samuel was the minister of Rowley. Most of the name in New England are believed to have descended from the minister of Watertown ; among them William Phillips, Lieutenant-Governor of Massachusetts, Samuel and John, founders of the academies of Andover and Kxctcr, Juliii, the lirst mayor of Boston, and Wendell Phillips, the philantiimpist and orator.

Rev. John Knowlcs, who was a native of Lincolnshire, became a stmlciil at Magilalcii College, Candjridgc, and was chosen a fellow of Katliarine Hall in 1025. He had here at one time forty ])U|)ils, many of whom were sidjsecpiently distingiiislicil as inciidiers of piirliaincnt or as luvnchcrs. Aftrruards, when a i.-clMivr at C(,lchcst,T, he incurred the eiunity of Archbishop l/iiul, wlio revoked his liecTise, and in 16."5!) he cam(^ to New England. Governor Winthrop, speaking of his ordination, and referring to the strict independency of the Watertown church, says: "The church of Watertown ordained Mr. Knowles, a good man and a prime scholar pastor, and so they had now two pastors and no teacher, differing from the practice of the other churches, as also they did in their privacy, not giving notice thereof to the neighboring churches, nor to the magistrates, as the common practice was." xVfter a pastorate of about ten years Mr. Knowles returned to England, and preached in the cathedral at Bristol until silenced in 1662 by the Act of Uniformity. From October, 1642, to June, 1643, he had performed missionary labor in Virginia. He was privately preaching in London when the plague broke out in 1665, and rendered great service in that terrible exigency. In 1672 he became colleague to Rev. Thomas Kentish, at St. Katharine's, and died April 10, 1685, at an advanced age.

Few of our early divines were so eminently distinguished for intellectual gifts and Chrisrian graces as the Rev. John Sherman, born in Dedham, Essex, England, December 26, 1613. His deep religions impressions were derived from the ministry of Rev. John Rogers. Educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, he came, in 1634, to New England, where he acquired a very high reputation, his eloquence earning for him the title of "the goldenmouthed preacher." Mather says that on a Thanksgiving day, in Watertown, Mr. Sherman preached his first sermon as an assistant to Mr. Phillips, in the prcsnue (if many other divines, who " wondered exci riliiii:l\ " at this early display of his ability. Alter two or three years' service as a magistrate of New Haven colony, he became Mr. Knowles' colleague in 1647, and was sole pastor from 1650 until his death, August 8, 16S5. After his settlement he was chosen a fellow of Harvard College, and for thirty years gave lectures once a fortnight, which were attended by the students, who walked from Cambridge to hear him. His favorite studies were astronomy and mathematics, in which he was the foremost man of his time in this country. For many years he ])ublislied an almanac, to which he added pious reflections. He was one of the moderators of the Hdorming Synod at Hoston, in September, r67'J, and in 1682 preached beloiv the convention of ministers in Massachusetts, Mr. Sliernian is said to have had twenty-six ehildren, tHvnty of whom were by his second uile, a graiuldaughti'r of the Earl of Rivers.

Perhaps tlie first instance of an installation in the colony was that of Rev. John Bailey, at Watertown, October 6, 1686, the usual method of induction to clerical office being by ordination. He was so popular that people ilocked to the communion in such numbers that " the neigliborhood could not supply elements enough." Born near Blackbourne, Lancashire, England, in 1643, he had been for fourteen years a preacher in Limerick, Ireland, but, having been silenced and thrown into prison for non-conformity, came to Boston in 1684. Ill health and melancholy caused his return to that place in 169;i, where he was assistant minister of the First Church from 169.3 until his death, December 12, 1697. His brother. Rev. Thomas Bailey, " a painful preacher," was his colleague in Watertown from November 2, 1687, until his death, January 21, 1689; to whom Mr. Henry Gibbs succeeded November 3, 1690. Mather, alluding to the success of Mr. Bailey's ministry, says, " He seemed rather to fish with a net than with an hook for the Kingdom of God " ; and John Dunton, wlio visited the brothers, thus refers to them: "These are two popular preachers, and are very generous to strangers. I heard Mr. John upon these words, ' Looking unto Jesus,' and I thought he spake like an angel."

Ever since Mr. Phillips' time there had been " an earnest contending " about the place of meeting, which was remote from the centre of the territory and population of the town. The controversy culminated when Mr. Bailey removed to Boston in 1692, and the erection of a new house was proposed. The matter was referred to the governor and council, who. May IS, 1693, advised the building of a meeting-house for the whole town on the knoll, between the house of Widow Stearns and Whitney's Hill. The opposition to this plan by the east part of the town was so fierce that a town-meeting, held October 2, 1694, was obliged to be adjourned, " to prevent such inconvenience as might justly be feared by reason of the heat of spirit that then seemed to prevail." Notwithstanding the strong opposition, eighty-two residents of the easteru and thirty-three of the western portions of the town uniting in a protest against it, a levy was made and a house built on the southeast corner of Lexington and Belmont streets, in which a town-meeting was held December 20, 1695, and February 4, 1696, it was accepted by the town as the place of public worship. In March the town voted that town-meetings should in future be held in it. Mr. Samuel Angier, son of Edmund Angler, of Cambridge, where he was born March 17, 1655, was called to preach in the new house August 28, 1696, and ordained May 25, 1697. Descended maternally from the famous Dr. William Ames, he was graduated at Harvard College in 1673, was ordained at Rehoboth, October 19, 1679, and died in Watertown, January 21, 1719. When the town was divided, Mr. Angler's society built their meeting-house in the West Precinct, and it became the church of Waltham. Mr. Angler's successor (1723 -1751) was Rev. Warhani Williams, son of Rev. John, of Deerfield, who with his family was carried away into captivity by the Indians in 1704.

Mr. Gibbs, who had declined the offers of the western party, and who was fully in sympathy with the people at the east end of the town, to whom he had preached in the old house for nearly seven years, was ordained over the new society, organized here October 6, 1697. So much ill-feeling had grown out of this quarrel that, though the day was cold,. the ceremony, which took place in the afternoon, was obliged to be performed in the open air. The western party, having the selectmen on their side, got possession of the meeting-house, and would not suffer the assembly to enter there. Henry, son of Robert Gibbs, a wealthy and prominent merchant of Boston, graduated at Harvard College in 1685, and died October 21, 1723, aged fifty-five. His sound sense and discretion is seen in the fact that, in the difficult position in which he was placed, and amid the angry discussion and strife that prevailed in the town during his ministry, he was held in the highest respect, and received no word of censure from either faction. He possessed warm piety, real kindness, and a welldirected zeal in doing good. Though his habit was to write his sermons on the bellows in the chimney-corner, it should not be inferred that they were at all inflated thereby, his pulpit ministrations being highly esteemed both by his own and neighboring parishes. His society, embracing the whole of the Eastern Precinct, continued to occupy the old meeting-house.

A Mr. Robert Sturgeon, having, " without due advice and direction, gone on to the public actions of a pastour" to a small number of brethren, who had attempted the formation of a third church, soon found himself in troubled \vaters. A council of fourteen churches, convened at Watertown, May 1,1722, with Rev. Cotton Mather for moderator, declared that he had no right to the office of pastor among them ; that he ouglit uo longer to preach nor exercise any part of the ministry there ; and judged him unworthy to be employed until he made "a public satisfaction." The brethren were at the same time admonished " to repent of and depart from their disorderly and schismaticall proceedings, as they would avoid a further and more awful censure upon tlieir offences." Mr. Sturgeon was also indicted by the grand jury for " continuing his wicked and malicious inclinations to overthrow, ruin, and subvert, as well the churches of said Watertown as the other churches of this province/' and was found guilty and fined ££0 and costs. All this terrible outcry was owing to the fact that those best accommodated by the Angier meeting-house where it was were not disposed to comply with the advice of the committee, and determined to maintain worship where for twentyfive years they had gathered for that purpose, and had employed Mr. Sturgeon as their pastor. Though the persons principally complained of declined to attend the council, they lieeded its admonitions. Mr. Sturgeon's friends gradually withdrew, and the meeting-house, which for thirty years had been a bone of contention, was closed, and has long since disappeared.

Mr. Gibbs' successors in tlie First Cluirch were : Seth Storer, from 1724 to 1774; Daniel Adams, from April to August, 1778 ; Richard R. Elliott, a descendant of tlie Apostle to the Indians, from 1780 to 1818; Convers Francis, from 1819 to 184:J; John Weiss, from 184:i to 1847; Ilasbrouck Davis, from 1849 to 1853; George Bradford, from 1856 to 1859 ; Arthur B. Fuller, from ]S()i) to 1862; John Weiss, from 1862 to 1869; James T. Bixby, from 1870 to 187.3; Joseph F. Lovering, from 1875 to July 30, 1878. During the period in which iiis functions in tlie Brattle- Street Church, Boston, were suspended by Britisli occupancy, the eminently patriotic Dr. Samuel Cooper ministered to the Watertown clmrcli.

Many of the early settlers of llir I'aiin^ were from five to eiglit miles distant from llu' incclinghouse, and attended the meeting in Sudbury, but taxed for tlie support of tin; ministry in Watertown. At a town-meeling licld January 6, 17(11 1 711:!, it was v,,lcd tli:il " llic Imuiids of tlie Farmers' I'reeinet lor the minislry is from Charies IMver along the brook called Stony Hrook, that Cometh out of a pond called Beaver Pond, said precinct being on tlie westerly side of said brook."

Already, in March, 1700, the farmers had built and occupied a small house of worship, thirty feet square, on the land of Nathaniel Coolidge, a little in front of the present house. A church having been gathered and organized here, Mr. William Williams was ordained pastor, November 2, 1709, some three years before the Farms were incorporated as the town of Weston.

A Universalist church, erected by the Watertown and Newton societies, was dedicated August 15, 1827, and Rev. Russell Strecter installed pastor. He was succeeded by Rev. W. S. Balch, May 15, 1830. Services were discontinued in November, 1865, and the building, which is on Galen Street, is now the South Grammar Scliool.

The Baptist Meeting-house, built in 1858, is on the site of the first edifice, dedicated August 19, 1830, at which time Rev. Peter Chase was installed pastor. The society was organized, with forty-six members, July 18, 1830, at the house of Jesse Wheeler. Its pastors since Mr. Chase have been : Nicholas IMedbury, from October 19, 1832, to August 15, 1843; Edward D. Very, from December 19, 1843, to January 28, 1845; Charles H. Colver, from January 28, 1846, to 1850; B. A. Edwards, from September 17, 1850, to 1S55 ; William L. Brown, from February 2, 1855, to February 1, 1861 ; Alfred S. Patton, from June 11, 1861, to 1866; William F. Stubbert, from February 13, 1866, to 1869; G. S. Abbott, from December 14, 1869, to November, 1876; Edward A. Capeii, N(>vciid)cr 21, 1877. The present membership is tuo Inindred and eighty -four.

The Metlindist Society originated at the house of Leonard Whitney, where its meetings continued to be held until, in the autumn of 1S37, they bougiit the academy building on the hill. " This estate was sold in June, 1847, and has since been in the possession of the Roman Catholics. The present chnrcli, on Main Street, was consecrated October 20, 1847. The weathercock that surmounted its steeple, formerly belonging to the First Cluircli, was blown down in February, 1879, but is carefully preserved. The society, consisting at first of four ])ersons, - Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Whitney, John Devall, and Joshua Rhoades, - now numbers one inindred and twenty. Its first class was established and a Sunday school formed October 4, 1836, and at nearly the same period Charles S. Maereading ollieiateil as pastor. Father Pickering was appointeil their first conference brother, June 17, 1S.)7. The present pastor is T. W. Bishop.

The Phillips Congregational Church was organized April 17, 1855, with twenty-six members, Eev. Dr. Lyman Beecher acting pastor. Until its first edifice was ready for occupancy in April, 1857, services were held in the town-hall, where Dr. Beecher, the champion of Orthodoxy, preached once each Sunday, another discourse of a decidedly unorthodox complexion being given by Rev. Theodore Parker in the same place, on the same day, to seceders from the First Church. The present house, first occupied January 12, 1863, is on the site of the first, whicii was burned down on the night of January 13, 1861. Its successive pastors have been: S. R. Dennen, D. D., from July 11, 1855, to August 1, 1862 ; James M. Bell, from April 23, 1865, to May 23, 1871 ; Edwin P. Wilson, July 5, 1872. In the interim between the pastorates of Messrs. Dennen and Bell, William L. Gage, now of Hartford, preached one year, but was not settled.

Education. - Public instruction had before 1649 been made compulsory, each town of fifty householders being required to have a school for reading and writing, while each town of one hundred householders must have a grammar school, with a teacher competent to fit youths for the university. In that year the first school-house in the town was erected, probably on School-house Hill, and David Mitchell was requested to teach. Tiie first known teacher, Richard Norcross, was hired January 6, 1650 - 51, one year for £30, he being also allowed 2«. a head for keeping the dry herd. Norcross continued to teach until 1701, when he was seventynine years of age.

In 1667 the school was to be free to the inhabitants, others to pay as before, " their pay to go towards the teacher's salary." In 1667 the school hours were eight, between 7 a. m. and 5 p. m., from May to September, six hours from September to November, and in wiu(er from 10 to 2. In 1679 the selectmen agreed that " they would go two and two through the town to see that all the children be taught to read the English tongue, and some orthodox catechism, and to take the names of all youths from ten years' old unto twenty years' old, that they may be publicly catechised . by the pastor in the meeting-house." In 1683 those west of Stony Brook were freed from the school tax, that they might provide their own teaching. In 1694 schooling was to be paid by. the parents, "for English Zd. per week, writing 4^^. a week, Latin Qd. a week. The teacher also to catechise scholars and all other persons that are sent to iiim." In 1709 a school-house was built near Mr. Angler's meeting-house, 25 x 20 feet.

In accofdance with the recommendation of the legislature in 1733, the town in that year resolved to have two school-houses, and to employ two schoolmasters. In 1771 it was agreed that there should be five women's schools, three on the north side of the town and two on the south side, and to allow hs. and ^d. per week to each of the mistresses " they finding houses to keep in. Said schools to be kept twelve weeks each." In 1830 there were four public schools, two of which were kept throughout the year, the other two being taught by masters in the winter and by female teachers in the summer, average attendance about 240. There are now six public schools, including a high school established in 1853, with an average attendance of 876.

On the southeast corner of Arlington and Mount Auburn streets is one of the oldest graveyards in New England. The first mention of it in the town records occurs July 5, 1645, when a "sufficient" fence was ordered to be set up about it. There is a tradition that on the opposite side of Mount Auburn Street, on the southerly corner of Joseph Bird's estate, there was an earlier burial-place, soon abandoned. Among the oldest stones remaining are those of Sarah Hammond, 1674, Captain Hugh Mason, 1678, and Hannah Coolidge, 1680. Here are the tombs of Rev. Thomas Bailey and his wife, " Pious Lydia," with their quaint inscriptions ; and here also a plain granite shaft, erected by his descendants, April 19, 1875, commemorates the patriot Joseph Coolidge, who fell at Lexington just a century before. The two next graveyards originated in a vote of the town January 1, 1702 -1703. That of Mr. Angler's society on Grove Street, near Beaver Brook, was the only one in Waltham for more than a hundred years. The Weston burying-ground was near the meetinghouse. The Village Burying-Ground, in Watertown, at the intersection of Mount Auburn and Common streets, dating from 1754, has been recently enlarged upon its northern border. Since its opening few interments have been made in the old yard.

Mount Auburn Cemetery, the first of the rural cemeteries of America, renowned for its extent, its natural beauty, and its artificial embellishments, is the burial-place of many of the wealthy and dis- tinguished of the metropolis of New England, and of a wide region around it. Situated in the midst of the small lots of the first planters of the town, its area of one hundred acres doubtless includes some of their old hoinestalls. Owing to the roughness of its surface, its thick growth of forest trees, its ravines and rocky eminences, little of its area was adapted to tillage. Much of Deacon Simon Stone's estate of fifty acres is probably embraced in it, hence its old name, - Stone's Woods. A number of Deacon Stone's descendants yet reside on portions of the ancestral estate, while on the very spot where he first pitched his tent Mr. Winchester, thirty years ago, erected what was at that time the finest mansion on Charles Eiver. Mount Auburn had for many years been the resort of parties of pleasure, when it came into the possession of ilr. George W. Brimmer, who sold it for .$6,000 to the Massachusetts Horticultural Society for a cemetery, the idea of which originated with Dr. Jacob Bigelow. It was formally dedicated September 2-I', 1831. Its beautiful chapel contains statues of John Wrnthrop by Grecnough, John Adams by Kogers, Joseph Story by his son, William W. Story, and James Otis by Crawford.

A little to the east of Mount Auburn Mr. Eichard Browne was allowed by the court, November 5, 16:33, "to keep a Ferry over Charles River against his house, to have 2r/. for every single person he so transports and Id. apiece if there be two or more."

The earliest bridge in Watertown was the footbridge over Charles River at the head of tide-water, very near the first mill, usually called Mill Bridge, or the Great Bridge. In June, 1641, the court ordered that " the toll of Mr. Mayhew's bridge is referred to the Governor and two magistrates to settle for 7 years." In 161:5 the court granted Mayhew 300 acres of land in regard of his charges about the bridge atAValcrtown mill, and the bridge to hiloiig to the country. The first horse-bridge was iiuilt licrc in Hits. Its frecpient repairs or rel)uililing in ihr \\v>\ liuHilredyears was a hcax) burelm 1(1 the town, and aid was several times asked of thr cnuuly, but without success. 'I'lie first bridge for « hcrl-earriages was built about 1720, where the jncMiit hiidgc is, a few rods above the site of the original structure.

The fishery of Charles River was formerly l.'l out by the town, and produced an annual iiieonie of -onie .S7(ll), there being "great store" of bass, .sliad, ami ahwives. Latterlv this sum had been divided between Watertown and Brighton, the latter receiving three tenths. Owing to the impurities discharged from the gas-works, the dye-house, and the factories, the fish ceased to come up the river, and since 1860 no income has been derived from this source. The weir was built just below the fall, in the spring of 1632, probably by the enterprising John Oldham, whose house, burned in August following, stood near it. Governor Winthrop's assent to its erection, without an order of the court, was brought up against him by Deputy-Governor Dudley when, not long afterward, these two worthies had their famous quarrel.

Owned at first by the town, the weir afterwards became private property, and was held in shares. In 1634 fishing near it with nets was prohibited. In 1635 " four rods in breadth on each side of the River and in length as far as need shall require, so as not to prejudice the water mill," was granted it, also in 1636 a tract of one hundred and fifty acres on the south side of the river opposite the bridge, confirmed by the court to Thomas j\Iayhew in 1611. In i671 the Indians, being " like to buy the privilege," and " being like to be bad neighbors," the town voted, " all as one man," to purchase the weir for the use of the town. After Waltham and Weston were incorporated they retained a joint projirietorship in the weir, which continued until cancelled in 1802, on condition of their exoneration from contributing to the maintenance of the Great Bridge over Charles River. Complaints were made of the Watertown people to the General Court as early as in 173S, and frequently thereafter, by New ton, Natiek, and other towns, for stopping the course of the fish in the river.

It is probable that the first mill in Watertowti was built in 1634 by Edward How. It was a grist-mill, on Mill Creek, a canal partly or wholly artificial, leaving the river at Ihe head of the falls, where a stone dam was afterward made across the river. During Philip's War the mill was intrusted to the guard of Richard Sanger, his two sons, and three others. In 1780 Daniel Jackson had a saw-mill here. In 179.') ]\Iessrs. G. and F. Williams had a paper-mill heiv, the same afterwards known as .\nnis', and latterly as llollingsworlh and Whitney's. A fulling-mill on iieaver linnik, supposed to have been where Kendall's Mills now are, was the next mill built here. In 1(')70 a corn-mill was set up on Stony Brook. About 1760 David Bemis built a mill about a mile above the old one, and another was built by John Boies where the Waltham factories liave since been built. Since the ojjening of the century a number have been erected, absorbing a large amount of capital, and giving employment to numerous families.

In 1778 the dam at Bemis' Station, where the Etna Mills now are, about one mile above the old mill, was built by David Bemis and Dr. Enos Sumner. Bemis owned two thirds of a paper-mill on the Newton side, built in 1779, and before 1790 also carried on a grist-mill and snuff-mill on the Watertown side, - the first mill at that point. His son Seth became sole proprietor about 1796, and in 1803 began to spin cotton by machinery, a business that proved exceedingly profitable. Cotton sail-duck, for which a twisting-machine of forty-eight spindles was constructed, was first made here in 1809. In 1816 the introduction of the power-loom and other improvements reduced the price of duck one half. Afterwards, in connection with his son, Seth, Jr., and until he gave up business in 18-"36, he made mis the leading factory in the country for grinding and preparing dyestuffs.

Having in 18^1 become sole owner of the waterpower, Mr. Bemis built the present stone rolling dam in front of the old one. The Bemis Manufacturing Company, incorporated in 18:i7, transferred its property and rights in 1860 to the Etna Mill Company, which enlarged the works, and which manufactures woollen fabrics by both water and steam power. Between 1790 and 1796 Bemis constructed a bridge over the river, which in 1807 was swept away by a freshet. A foot-bridge, built soon after, was also swept away in 1818. The present bridge was built not long after.

In September, 1635, John Masters was licensed by the court to keep an ordinary. June 6, 1637, George Munnings w"as fined 20*. for selhng beer, and keeping a house of entertainment without a license. Captain Richard Beers was licensed in 165-1, and Captain Abiier Crafts in 177:?. South of tlie bridge, on the east side of the way, is an old building of the Revolutionary era kept as a tavern from 1761. to 1770 by Nathaniel Coolidge, and afterwards by his widow. It was in 1770 known as the " sign of Mr. Wilkes near Nonantum Bridge," and was the appointed rendezvous for the Committee of Safety in May, 1775. Here Washington tarried while on his way to Cambridge to take command of the army, in order to pay his respects to Congress, then in session, and here too he lodged while making his presidential tour in 1789. Opposite the entrance to California Street, near by, is the old John Cook house, where Henry Knox, afterwards General Knox, resided for a while in 1775. In one of its chambers Paul Revere engraved and printed the colony notes issued by the Provincial Congress.

The Spring Hotel, built of brick in 1824 by a son of Dr. Spring, was partly burned in the great fire of 1841. On its site Caleb Church kept an ordinary from 1686 to 1711. His successor was Thomas Learned, licensed in 1712. Mary, his widow, and his sons, Abijah and Bezaleel, kept it successively until 1771.

Early in 1816 Captain Talcott, an officer of the army, selected the site for the United States Arsenal at Watertown, on the margin of the Charles River, where the first landing of white men in that town had been made, the state ceding to the United States the jurisdiction of an area not to exceed sixty acres. To the original purchase of forty acres subsequent additions were made, the last of which, September 25, 1867, of forty-four acres, brought its total area up to one hundred acres. An encampment of about fifty friendly Indians, of the Stockbridge tri'be, nestled here during the investment of Boston by the patriot army, in 1775-70.

The buildings, completed in 1820 under the superintendence of Captain Talcott, were two magazines of stone, erected several hundred feet from the other buildings, which are of brick, upon the four sides of a parallelogram, wliich faces the four cardinal points, the spaces between being filled by a wall fifteen feet in height. There have since been constructed a number of other buildings, some of them made necessary by the exigencies of the great civil war, rendering it an arsenal of construction as well as of deposit. These include two large timber store-houses, a carriage and machine shop, and a smith's shop ; also a laboratory, gasworks, brass and iron foundry, and new quarters for the commanding officer, built in 1865.

During the War of the Rebellion Captain, afterwards Brevet Brigadier-General, T. J. Rodman, the inventor of the famous Rodman gun, was in command, the working force at tliat time being upwards of one thousand persons, including men, women, boys, and girls. The operations were confined principally to the manufacture of wooden field-carriages, iron carriages for heavy seacoast guns, artillery implements and equipments, ainmunition for small arms and for field, siege, and sea-coast service. The enlisted force during the war was one hundred and ten men; the present number is twenty-two.

The town-hall was dedicated November 6, 1846. The free public library, established in 1868 and opened for the delivery of books in March following, occupies a portion of the building. It contains 12,000 volumes, nearly as many pamphlets, and has a well-furnished reading-room. Watertown lias a National Bank, opened in 1873, and a fSuviiigs-Bank.

Pc(iuussette Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, constituted in January, received its charter December 23, 1857, having thirty-three members. Its place of meeting until 1870 was in Dana's Block; its ])resent hall is in Noyes' Block, opposite the town-hall. Most of the charter members of Belmont Lodge, and many of Dalhousie Lodge, Newton, received their degrees in Pequossette Lodge. Its present membership is one hundred and twenty-two.

In the early days property was very evenly distributed. For eighty years after the first settlement tiiere were not more than one or two inventories that exceeded £700. Taxation, as in all new countries, was necessarily heavy. The aimual expense of snpporiiiiL; llir ministry iilmic in the time of Rev. Mr. Nlicnn;ni was about lw(, per (viit of the whole assessed value; of the town. The number of taxable persons between lii.'iS and l(iS5 fluctuated from 153 to 192. A tax <.f \,l. iii the pound fur the hnilding of a new Mi(i'lini,'-li(iusc in I(i'.t5 amonntrd to £320 An., sli,.wni,- a total .valuation of 119,212. In 1879 the total valuation was $7,027,500; number of polls, ],26(); school-children between the aires of live and fifteen

For a time the population of Watertown, as shown by the tax-levy, equalled that of Boston, but it was soon outstripped by the superior advantages of the seaport town. In the first two hundred years it increased very slowly. Beginning in 1630 with forty heads of families - about 250 persons - in 1840 it had increased only to 1,810 souls, owing in part to amputations of its territory, and in part to successive migrations. These causes were especially active between the years 1651, when there were 160 families, and 1790, when they numbered but 104. The largest increase, that of the decennial period ending in 1875, when the census showed a population of 5,599, 1,456 of whom were of foreign birth, was mainly due to building enterprises.

Out of a population of 1,518 in 1820, 179 were engaged in manufacturing and 145 in agricultural pursuits. At present the occupations of the people are greatly diversified. According to the state census of 1875 there were engaged in manufacturing and mechanical occupations, 851; trade and transportation, 387 ; agriculture, 191. There were twenty-six manufacturing establishments ; capital, .'51,033,075; value of product, $1,875,455 ; and thirty-six other occupations, with a capital of $272,292, producing $835,336. Value of hay and other agricultural produce, $101,500. The principal establishments are the Etna Woollen Mill, a paper-mill, a manufactory of bronze goods, and another for stoves. The Union Market, whose extensive buildings make one of the stations of the Pitchburg Railroad, now shares with Brighton the large cattle-trade once exclusively belonging to the latter.

Dr. Marshall Spring, a distinguished physician of Watertown, descended from John, an early settler, and his wife, Elinor, was born February 19, 1741-42, and died January 7,1818. Graduating at Harvard College in 1762, he was aided in obtaining his medical education by his maternal uncle, Dr. Josiah Converse, who. biMpical lied to him the larger part of his estate. Willi the exception of a brief sojourn in the island of St. Eustalia, he always resided in his native town, sustaining a wide-spread professional repute, and attracting patients from a great distance. In pleasant weather his house, especially on Sunday mornings, was thronged with persons seeking medical advice. He was an acute observer, possessed great sagacity, and was one of the few who could successfully meet Chief Justice Parsons in the keen encounter of wit. Though a tory in the Revolution, fully and firmly "convinced of the entire inexpediency of resistance," he was yet early in the field at Lexington, on the 19th of April," 1775, devoting his skill to his wounded fellow-citizens. So highly appreciated and so necessary to the people were his professional services, and so winning and benevolent were his manners, that, odious to them as were his political sentiments, he rarely suffered any serious annoyance on that account. He taught the school in Watertown in 1763, was a representative in 1787, and was frequently a member of the Executive Council of Massachusetts. Dr. Spring was rather short in stature, but was compact and well-proportioned, and was one of the handsomest men of his time. At his decease he left one of the largest estates ever bequeathed by a professional man in the state.

Colonel "William Bond, fourth in descent from W^illiiim, one of the early settlers of the town, was born February 17, 1738- 34. He was lieutenantcolonel of the Middlesex regiment of Colonel Gardiner, who fell mortally wounded at Bunker Hill, and, succeeding to the command, led it in the disastrous expedition to Canada. Retreating with the enfeebled remains of the army to Mount Independence, opposite Ticonderoga, he died there of smallpox, August 31, 1776. The family residence for one Inindred and seventy years (165.5 - 18;J5), now in Belmont, and originally the homestead of Captain William Jemiison, was latterly the elegant seat of Mr. John P. Cushing.

Dr. Henry Bond, a distinguished physician, grandson of Colonel William, was born in Watertown, March 21, 1790. Graduating at Dartmouth College in 1813, he studied medicine, and settled in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1816, but in 1819 removed to Philadelphia, where he became eminent in his profession, and died there. May 4, 1859. In 1855 he published his History and Genealogies of Waterfouni, one of the most valuable contributions to this department of research ever made. Dr. Bond was also the author of many important papers upon subjects connected with his profession.

John P. Cushing, a wealthy and benevolent citizen of Watertown, died in Belmont, April 12, 1862, aged seventy-six. Having in early life amassed a fortune in China, his subsequent career was marked by active participation in public enterprises, and by liberal but unostentatious charities. In his beautiful grounds, now belonging to Samuel R. Payson, he established a magnificent conservatory, which he liberally threw open to the public. His garden, now included in the town of Belmont, was a place of great attractiveness, to which thousands of admiring visitors flocked every season.

Convers Francis, D. D., a distinguished clergyman and scholar, was born in Arhngton, N^ovember 9, 1795; died April 7, 1863. He graduated at Harvard College in 1815, and was ordained over the First Parish of Watertown, June 23, 1819. After a us

Source changes here: from History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, by Drake, Samuel Adams, published 1880; 17,940 words in this source stream.

By Francis 8. Drake

ATERTOWN, one of the oldest towns in Alassachusetts, is pleasantly situated on the left bank of the Charles River, in the southeastern part of Middlesex County, seven miles from Boston, and is three miles in length, with an average width of about one mile. " - - It has Belmont on the north,

Cambridge on the east, Boston and Newton (from both of which it is separated by Charles River) on the south, and Waltham on the west. One hundred and fifty acres of its territory lying opjjosite the bridge, on the south side of the river, adjoin the town of Newton. It is traversed by a branch of the Fitchburg Railroad opened in 1846, while a horse-railroad unites it with Cambridge and Boston.

whose manufacturing interests now predominate, was essentially agricultural, and was second, in productiveness and fertility among the towns of the county, to West*Cambridge alone. These two towns were the market-gardens of Boston. The soil, with the exception of a portion at its aotttheastern extremity, is remarkably good. It consists principally of black loam, having a substratum of hard earth, so that it suffers little from summer droughts. Few New. England tonus have so large a proportion of land well adapted to tillage, or so little broken or waste land. In consequence of the scarcity of woodland, strict orders were very early passed for the preservation of trees, one or more of which were sometimes taken as compensation for debt or service. The Indian name of the town was long perpetuated in deeds describing Pequusset common or meadow, a tract of kind on the north border of the town, a little east of Lexington Street, for many years used as a cow common.

There, are few hills of anj magnitude. Strawberry Hill and Whitney's Hill are mentioned in the old records, llie former is the highest land in the town^ and is identical with §chool-hou$e Hill, afterwards called Meeting-^liouse Hill. Whitney^s Hill 'is supposed to be that latterly known as TVliite'^s Hill. Near this hill, at the comer of Lexin^pn and Belmont streets, stood the pound, construct^ about 1687. Prospect Hill, four hundred and eigtity-two feet in height, now in Waltham, the high^t elevation in old Watertown, commands a Tery wide, diversified, and beautiful pros})ect. Bear Hill, west of it, and bordering on Weston, has about the same height. Mackerel Hill, near the northeast comer of the town, has borne that name from a very early date. Mount Feake, the first hill spoken of in the eairly records of the town, nailed for Boberl Feake, is insignificant in magnitude, and has been nearly obliterated for the grading of a railroad.

None of the very early towns could compare with this in respect to its ponds and water-courses. Fresh Pond, the largest in the town, with an area of one hundred and seventy-five acres, now within the limits of Belmont, is the source of numerous nndergroufid streams. It has long been a famous lesort for summer recreation, and its attractive borders have fumished sites for many beautiful countryseats. The water of this pond is remarkably pure, and its ice is shipped in large quantities to all ))arts of the world. The public-house then on the margin of the pond was a place of refuge for the panicstricken women and children of the neighborhood on the memorable 19th of April, 1775. Forest Pond, probably the ancient Shallow Pond, is in Mount Auburn Cemetery. Sherman^s Pond, of about one hundred acres, more recently known as Fiske's Pond and Mead^s Pond, is within the high grounds of Waltham, and is the source of the ancient Chester Brook, or West Branch of Beaver mortality occurred among the fish in this pond, immense numbers of which were found lying dead on its. shores. A pond and an extensive bog called Beaver Meadow, through which Chester Brook passes, is about half a mile west of the site of the old Waltham meeting-house. It is supposed that this bog was fonnerly covered with water, and was the pond where, as Winthrop tells us, *'the beavers had shom down divers great trees, and made divers dams across the brook/' A little south of this is Lily Pond, of about four acres, u-ith its outlet through Beaver Mciidow into Giester Brook. The town originally contained a part if not tlie whole of Walden Pond, now in Concord, a part of 'Sandy Pond and the whole of Beaver Pond^ now in Lincoln, and a part of Nonesuch Pond, much of which is now in Natick.

Most of the southem border of the town is watered by the Charles, originally called the Massachusetts Biver, Its average width is eight rods; tide-water extends above the east border of the town, ai|d it is navigable for small vessels as far as the dam where the manufactories stand. At ^is point a fall fumished water-power for the first mill built in the town. Other falls above fumish powerfor the Etna Mills and for the upper and lower Waltham factories. Smelt Brook, one of the branches of the Charles, enters it on the south side, its source being in Newton. Beaver Brook, its first consid* erable tributary, is made up of two main branches .which unite about two hundred and fifty yards from the river, entering it at the lower end of Waltham Plain. The West Branch, two miles long, originating in Sherman's Pond and fussing ihrougli Beaver Pond, had upon it a mill, built probably by Deacou Thomas Livermore in the early port of the last century. The eastern and larger branch begins in Lexington, and runs through the eastern border of Waltham. This branch in early times was always called Beaver Brook, and the other, which watered Chester Meadow, was the ancient Chester Brook, named for Leonard Chester, who was here in 1633. Stony Brook, the largest tributary to Charles River, originates in Sandy Pond, mns south-southeast, and passing through Beaver Pond unites with the Charles about two miles above Beaver Brook. Tliere are several mills upon it. Its principal branch, tlie ancieut Stower's Brook, or Hobbs' Brook, originates in Lincoln, and after a course of four miles due south unites with Stony Brook about two miles from its junction with Charles River. Tins is supposed to be the stream formerly called Four- Mile Brook. Above and west of it is another of the original town. The Small Lots, as the houselots and homestalls were called, were scattered over its eastern portion, which embraces the present territory of the town. Tliey also included the meeting-house common of forty acres, Pequusset or King's Common, and Pequusset ^re;idow. Tlie Great Dividends were four tracts of land, sometimes caUed squadrons, running westward, each one hundred and sixty rods in breadth, and Uy next to the Cambridge Une on the north, bf^inning not far from the present boundary of Watertown and Waltham. Beaver Brook Ploughlands, partly meadow and partly upland, lay between the Great Dividends and Charles Biver. They began " next the small lots beyond tlie wear/^ and included Hither Plain or Little Plain, east of the brook, and Further Plain or the Great Plain, and later Waltham Plain, on the west. Tliese two divisions are included in the present Ifmits of Waltham. Between the Hither Plain and the Small Lots mn the Driftway, the present Gore Street. The Lien of Township Lots were west of Waltham Plahi, south of the Great Dividends, and extended beyond Stony BrooL Tlie Farms, or Farm Lands, now Weston, included what remained as far as the Sudbury and Dedham bounds.

Of the early roads, most of which remain, the most important were Mill Street and Sudbury Boad, the one terminating and the other beginning at the mill, near the weir. Mount Auburn Street, as Mill Street is now called, began below Mount Auburn, and passing by the old graveyard, tehninated at the mill at the lowest falls on Charles Biver. ' It was also known as the Cambridge Boad, or the Boad to the College. The Sudbury Boad, extending westward from the mill, is now Main Street, retaining this name through Waltham. It was the great thoroughfare from Boston, passing over the Neck, through Boxbury, Brookline, Newton, and over Mill Bridge, thence westward to New York, and then to the southward, and was for a long time the principal road in the colonies. The very ancient road from Cambridge to Waltham, long known as the Back Boad, is now Belmont Street. Lexin^on Street, beginning at Belmont Street and extoiding north by Elbow Hill, was anciently called the Concord Boad.

Prior to the settlement of Concord and Dedham, in 1635, the only definite boundary of the town was that between it and Newtown (Cambridge), the line running from Fresh Pond west-northwt'st straight into the country. March 2, 1G36, its westem limit was fixed by an order of the court that " tlie bounds of Watertown shall run 8 miles into the country from their tneeting-house.'' June 8, I63S, the court ordered '' for the final end of all diiference between Watertown, Concord, and Dedham, that Watertown eight miles shall be extended upon the Hue between them and Cambridge as far as Concord i bounds give leave ; and that their bounds by the river shall run eight miles into the country in a straight line, as also the river doth for the most part run.^' Her original eastern boundar}' is supposed to correspond very nearly with the present Vassal Lane and Sjxirks Street, Cambridge, beginning at the southeast side of the East Bav of Fresh Pond, and running to the most northerly point of the bend in the river. The division Une between Watertown and Sudbury was settled by commissioners in May, 1651.