Early Acton History
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By Lemuel Shattuck
HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF CONCORD;
Middlesex County Massachusetts, from its earliest settlement to 1832
John Law - The First Settler
Remembered by Marion E. H. Houghton
complied by Rev. Franklin P. Wood
by the Acton Historical Society, Acton Mass.
By Robert Nylander
Assabet Valley BEACON, Thursday, June 28, 1973
History of Acton
By Lemuel Shattuck
Chapter XVIII. Pages 274-281
HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF CONCORD;
Middlesex County Massachusetts, from its earliest settlement to 1832;
And adjoining towns,
BEDFORD, ACTON, LINCOLN AND CARLISLE
Containing various notices of county and state history not before published.
Published by Russell, Odiorne and Company
The town of Acton lies wholly within the ancient limits of Concord. It does not, however include any part of the six miles square first purchased of the Indians, but in subsequent grants and purchases, adjoining and lying westerly of the “old town”. These lands were granted to the town of Concord “for feeding”; excepting the Iron-Work Farm, Major Simon Willard's farm in the north part of the tract, and two grants near Nagog Pond, one to the Indians, and the other to Joseph Wheeler and others. An account of these grants has already been given in the History of Concord. Their bounds, s renewed in 1706, began where the present southeast corner of Acton meets with Concord and Sudbury, and ran nearly on the present line separating Acton and Stow, Boxborough and Littleton, till it comes to the “westerly end of Nagog Pond” and from thence “up to the line of Chelmsford towards Tagnack,” (near Heartwell tavern now in Westford”; from thence the line ran easterly to the north part of “Virginia Meadow,” or “Blood's Dam,” so called Carlisle; and thence by Billerica to “Berry Corner,” and by Concord old bounds to the place first mentioned. Though the bounds or extents of the several grants, which make up this extensive tracts of land, are not very particularly defined, the description is sufficiently accurate to enabler us to form tolerably correct idea of each. When actually surveyed, they were found to contain a greater number of acres than nominally specified on the grants. The section lying in the southeast part of the “Village” as it was called, nominally contained 1,000 acres, but actually contained more than that number, was granted to Major Willard for the benefit of the Iron Works, and known as the Iron-Work Farm. This was conveyed to James Russell, Esq. Of Charlestown, when Mr. Joseph Sherman was employed as an assistant in the business, and by him 600 acres of it were sold in 1701 to Samuel and Ephraim Jones, and Jonathan Knight, together with all his right in the village, for L 150. This tract and another northerly, conveyed by deed from the Indians in 1684 already given, the grants to Joseph Wheeler in 1660, to major Willard in 1665 in the north part, and the half of Nashoba purchased by the Hon. Peter Bulkeley and the Hon. Thomas Henchmenin 1686, covered much more land that is now included in Acton. Littleton took a part near Nagog Pond, and Westford and Carlisle a large tract on the north and northeasterly sections. Considerable difficulty arose between the proprietors of the Village and the proprietors of individual grants, included in the above described lands, concerning their boundary lines. The heirs of Robert Blood inherited the Willard farm. Their title was however doubted, and after perplexing controversies and lawsuits, it was finally adjusted about 1710.
The disposal of these lands, and the manner in which they should be divided, occupied the attention of the proprietors for many years. Meetings were held on the 16th of June 1719, legally summoned by James Minott, Esq., on the 9th, 22nd, and 29th of March and on the 8th of July 1720, at which several votes
A settlement was commenced in these grants as early as 1656, and perhaps a few years earlier. The shepherd and Law families were among the first. Captain Thomas Wheeler commenced an extensive improvement here in 1667, as noticed in the History of Concord. Several others had particular lots granted or sold to them by special vote of the town.
Many of the meadows were open prairies, and afforded, with little or no labor, grass in abundance. Some of the uplands had been cleared by the Indians, and were favorite places for feeding. The meadows were leased, and the rents either paid into the town treasury, or reserved for the proprietors. In 1706 the meadows were leased to Jonathan Knight and Ephraim Jones for them L5 6s. and about the same sum was annually received for them for some years afterwards.
These lands were granted to the proprietors of the town of Concord at the time the grants were made. And, though the selectmen, under direction of the town, managed them as they did other common property, they were considered distinct from the whole town about 1690. New emigrants into Concord were not considered as proprietors. In 1697 a committee was chosen to obtain a list of the proprietors, who after several consultations concerning the best method of admitting them, proposed, June 29, 1702, “that every freeholder that was possessed of house and land in the year 1684, and makes it so appear, shall be added to the former proprietors.” The proprietors, as admitted by committee according to the above regulation, were generally accustomed to hold their meeting immediately after town meetings, and on the same day, from 1698 to 1710; and their proceedings were recorded by the town clerk with the proceedings of Concord. A Village clerk was first chosen in 1710.
The disposal of these lands, and the manner in which they should be divided, occupied the attention of the proprietors for many years. Meetings were held on the 16th of June 1719, legally summoned by James Minott, Esq., on the 9th, 22nd, and 29th of March, and on the 8th of July at which several votes were passed, one of which was to admit persons who were freeholders in town in 1684 to rights in proportions to 1 to 3 of the freeholders in 1661; and committees were chosen to obtain lists of the proprietors agreeably to this vote; and divide the meadows into 120 thirty acre lots. As these committees proceeded in their business, so many obstacles presented themselves, that the plan was finally relinquished. Another vote was passed to divide it in proportions as 1 to 2 for times above mentioned, but this was also unsuccessful.
At length a petition was preferred to the town of Concord, which resulted in the following proceedings.
“We the subscribers being chosen a committee by the town of Concord at a general meeting on May the 25th, 1722, continued by adjournment from the 15th of said month, to consider and make report what we think is proper for the said town to do about their Village or New Grant, report as follows.”
“1. We find the grant from the general Court, as also the Indian deeds of conveyance from the Indians were made to the inhabitants and proprietors of the town of Concord
“2. We find no act of the said town of Concord, in any town meeting legally warned for the purpose, that has fully settled the proprietors or altered the constitution thereof, but considerable to the contrary.
“We are therefore humbly of opinion as followeth.
“1. That the town pass an order to forbid all person cutting wood, timber, &c., on the Village without order, and that the town do forthwith proceed and choose a committee, and fully empower them to prosecute at the law all persons that do any ways trespass on their said New Grants by cutting wood or timber contrary to order.
“2. That the town choose a committee to enquire into the matter of a farm-grant made out of the premises to Joseph Wheeler, whether the present proprietors thereof have not encroached and come beyond their bounds and to make a report.
“3. That the town, as soon as may be, settle the proprietors of the premises, and in order thereunto do choose a committee to consider of and report under their hands unto the town, what they think is the most just, honest and safe rule, for stating the proprietors and diving thereof, and present it to the town for their further consideration.”
This document is dated November 12, 1722, and signed by Richards Parks, John Wheeler, Nathaniel Stow, Samuel Wright, Samuel Chandler, John Fassett, and David Whitaker.
The committee proposed in this report were chosen, and reported the next February, “that reach freehold of house and lands, that was such in the year 1666 or in the year 1684, to have five acre rights in said Village or Town's New grant; and each freeholder of house and lands, that was ratable in the year 1694, to have a four-acre right in the premises; and each freehold of house and land, that was ratable in the year 1704, to have a three-acre right; and each freehold of house and land, ratable in the year 1714, to have two-acre right; and each freehold of house and land, ratable in 1722, to have a one-acre right, but none to draw in more that one order for freehold abovementioned. And we think it very proper, that a committee be chosen to take a list of the proprietors in each order as above said, that each proprietor may know his right, that when the Village is divided, it may be divided as above said.
“Noah Brooks, Samuel Wright, Joseph Fletcher, Richard Parks, John Fassett, George Farrar, Samuel Chandler, John Fox, and Samuel Heywood.”
This report was accepted by a ballot of 60 to 2; but after it was declared 14 others came in and requested to have their dissent recorded. A committee, to make a list of proprietors agreeably to this vote, was chosen, who reported at length at a subsequent meeting; and other preliminary arrangements were made for dividing the Village. But 25 freeholders dissented; and there appeared so much want of harmony on the subject, that the plan was finally relinquished. Meantime some of the common land had been taken up and improved, and some of the occupants were prosecuted and tried before the court.
At length, after several more meetings, the proprietors voted, June 16, 1725, “That all such as are possessed of a freehold, consisting of a dwelling-house and improved land in Concord, which was such a freehold in the year of our Lord 1661, shall have or draw 3 acres; and all such as are possessed of a freehold, which consist of a dwelling -house and improved lands in said Concord in the year 1684, shall have a or draw 2 acres; and all such as are possessed of a freehold, which consisted of a dwelling-house and improved land in said Concord in 1715 shall have or draw 1 acre; or agreeable to that proportion, except when the right said Village or New Grant is sold or reserved from said freehold. And “Ensign William Wheeler, Mr. Samuel Jones and Mr. Ebenezer Wheeler were chosen a committee to draw a list of all proprietors of said Village or New Grant according to the votes of the proprietors.”
This, though afterwards remodeled, formed the basis of the principle by which the division was made, and settled this difficult subject. It was rendered more explicit by a vote passed June 30, 1727, which was, “That the committee chosen for the laying out of said lands in said Village, be hereby directed to lay out so much of the best of the lands as to lay to every acre right 10 acres, so that every '61 right (so Called) being 3 acres, be laid into 30 acre lots; and every '84 right (so called) into 20 acre lots; and every late allowed right (so called) into 10 acre lots. And all the meadows be divided to each according to the several rights as aforesaid proportionally; and all said lots and the meadows to be laid so as to be made equally good as possible may be, either enlarging or abating of the number of acres in each lot, as said committee may think best to proportion the same.”
And another vote passed May 17, 1728. - Whereas it has been voted and agreed, that all the rights in the Village should be laid out into 10 acre lots, 20 acre lots and 30 acre lots, so that every freehold, that consisted of a dwelling-house and improved land in `61, should draw 30 acres, and every freehold, that was so in '84, have 20 acres, and that every freehold, that was so in '15 have 10 acres; but since thought better to lay it out into bigger lots, via, 100 acre lots; so that every 10 single rights may draw one of the 100 acre lots. And where it so happens that those that have but 10 acre lots, or those that have not 10 of those single rights to draw, and they can't agree to join 10 of them together to draw one of those 100 acre lots, it shall be in the power of the committee to join them and draw for them. Or appoint somebody to draw; and if they can't agree to subdivide, the committee shall subdivide it at the charge of the property.”
The committee for ascertaining the proportions, and for dividing the Village according to the forgoing principles, was a long time in accomplishing the business. A list was finally reported, which referred to the committee constituted by the following proceeding, had June 26, 1730.
“Voted, that Messsrs. Samuel Chandler, Benjamin Whittemore, and William Wheeler be a committee to correct the list of proprietors (more especially the first order), and present the same to the proprietors for their approbation; as also to take an account of the proprietors that do agree to join in the same hundred-acre lot and to join or couple such as cannot to agree to do it themselves, and see that no two be joined upon the same right, and also to subdivide the r hundred-acre lots where proprietors cannot agree to divide themselves.”
The common Land was laid out into lots nominally, but not uniformly of 100 acres, and numbered in the lists and on the plan. Several of the proprietors had their rights coupled or joined together, and their lots were drawn according to this coupling-list and subdivided according to each one's particular right. When lots happen to be poor, or of unequal value, some part of other lots were taken and added to them. These were called qualification lots. This method of division, though it might have been equitable, destroyed the uniform size and shape of the lot, and rendered the farm disconnected and irregular.
Three divisions took place. At first, September 9, 1730, were drawn 53 coupling lots, or 310 rights, At the second, July 7, 1732, 60 coupling lot; and 37 at the last and third, December 4, 1756. The proceedings during these intermediate dates related principally to the grants and division o the lands. At the last period, 1745, a vote was passed to sell all the common lands that remained. The proprietors clerk were as follows: Thomas Brown 1710 to 1715; Jonathan Prescott, 1715 to 1728, John Flint, 1728 to 1745; Stephen Hosmer, 1745 to ___; and John Robbins from 1786.
A plan of Concord Village was taken in 1730 by Captain Stephen Hosmer; and it then contained, exclusive of Major Willard's farm, 12,986 acres. A petition was presented to the town of Concord in 1731, for leave to be set off into a separate precinct, but it did not prevail. Three others subsequently presented met with the same fate. It seems that the petitioners were desirous of being incorporated as a precinct rather than a town. And though they were unsuccessful at first, the town voted, march 4, 1734, “to set off the Village or town's New Grant a separate town, together with Major Willard's Farm, and that the inhabitants and proprietors petition the General Court for a sanction.” Samuel Hunt and others presented a petition accordingly; and the following act of incorporation was obtained just one hundred years from the first incorporation of Concord.
“Whereas the inhabitants and proprietors of the northwesterly part of Concord, in the county of Middlesex, called the Village, or New Grant, have to this court, that they labor under great difficulties by reason of their remoteness from the place of public worship, and therefore desire that they and their estates, together with the farm, called Willard Farm, may be set off a distinct and separate township, for which they have also obtained the consent of the town of Concord.”
Be it therefore enacted by his Excellency the Governor, Council and Representatives, in General Court assemble, and by authority of the same, that the said northwesterly part of Concord, together with the said farms, be and hereby are set off, constituted, and erected into a distinct and separate township by the name of Acton, and agreeably to the following boundaries, namely; beginning at the southwest corner of Concord old bounds, then southwesterly on Sudbury and Stow lines till it comes to the southwest corner of Concord Village, the northwesterly by Stow line till it comes to Littleton line, then bounded northerly by Littleton, Westford and Chelmsford, then easterly by Billerica till it comes to the corner of Concord old bounds, and by said bounds to the place first mentioned. And that the inhabitants of the land before described and bounded, be and hereby are vested with all the town privileges and immunities that the inhabitants of the other town within this province are, or by law ought to be, vested with.
“Provided that the inhabitants of said town of Acton do, within three years from the publication of this act erect and finish a suitable house for the public worship of God, and procure and settle a learned, orthodox minister of good conservation, and make provisions for his comfortable and honorable support.” This act was passed July 3, 1735.
“Acton's Forgotten Man”
Remembered by Mrs. Houghton
Assabet Valley Beacon
January 28, and February 8, 1968
Members and guest of the Acton Historical Society met recently to hear Mrs. Hayward Houghton present her research findings on “Acton's Forgotten Man - The First Settler”.
These fascinating factual revelations, appearing in a short series as a community service of “The Beacon”, have stimulated plans for further probes into Acton's unknowns.
Area residents interested in any phase of historical program may call Mrs. Albert Wunderly or Mr. Jerry Balantine after 6:00 p.m.
Mrs. Brewster Conant and Mrs. Donald Nylander served coffee and assorted delicacies prior to the 7 o'clock program, and several guests were received into membership.
Meetings are held on the third Sunday evening beginning with dessert at 6:30. News of the next meeting, “Early Acton Churches”, Feb. 18 will appear in The Beacon” Feb. 15.
Acton's Forgotten Man. “The First Settler”
Marion E. H. Houghton
Acton was never “founded” as Boston and Concord were founded. No band of settlers headed by a minister or magistrate, pushed into the wilderness beyond Concord and said, - “We'll plant our town- here!” When the white man first possessed it, Acton was a part of Concord and settlers trickled in gradually from other parts of town. Because its early history is concurrent with that of Concord, it will be helpful to review the factors in Concord's history that influenced the settlement of Acton.
Simon Willard arrived in Boston in May 1634 and settled in Cambridge. Starting in to trade for furs with the Indians, he explored the land towards the west. In the decade of the thirties with thousand of new settlers pouring in, new towns were constantly springing up and those who had money to invest could make fortunes in land speculations. The prospect seemed attractive to Willard and, selecting a possible town site, he contracted various people with money to invest including Rev. Peter Bulkeley. This group appealed to the General Court and in September 1635 a grant of six miles square was made to Bulkeley, and Willard and about twelve families. These were the stockholders, some of whom never moved to Concord at all. It is thought that there were about forty actual settlers allotted land in 1636 in the first division.
The site Willard had chosen was on the bank of a brook which would furnish water for the livestock, temporarily also for settlers until wells were dug. The brook ran through grassy meadows and a river nearby also had wide meadows where hay could be cut for winter-feed for the livestock. This river was called by the Indians Musketaquid, which meant “Marsh-grass River.” The root is the same as that of mosquito, “ the marsh insect”. The river is now generally called the Sudbury. In the present more urban generation it is little realized how important natural meadowland was to a settler arriving in thickly wooded country. In Sudbury later divisions of land were based directly on how much meadow had been assigned each person in the beginning. For newcomers and sons comes to manhood this posed a hardship, and occasioned so much dissatisfaction that settlement of Marlborough was a direct result. Concord seemed to be well endowed with meadows. They had moreover, some planting fields already cleared by the Indians. The tribe resident in the Concord area had suffered an epidemic of smallpox in 1633 and there was only a remnant of the tribe left. These were willing enough to sell their land providing they retained their hunting rights, and a formal but friendly agreement was signed with them in 1636.
Edward Johnson in his “Wonder Working Providences of Sion's Savior in New England” printed gave a graphic description of the trails of these earliest settlers. He tells a much length of their difficulties in reaching their new homes. Concord was the first inland settlement not reached by water and there were no roads. The first dwellings, he says, were burrows in the side of Revolutionary Ridge supported by rough posts. The little settlement had heavy going at first. The first land cleared gave a poor crop and the marshes proved to be to wet that they were unable to get out a good crop of hay. Those who had invested heavily in livestock lost most of their animals. Some thought it was because of the lack of salty in their diets. Sheep especially failed to thrive and wolves ate the pigs. Many settlers left. In 1645 the town appealed to the General Court for an abatement of their taxes, citing their poor soil, wet meadows and low numbers.
Some late arrivals had noticed that to the west, just beyond Concord's six square miles of land, two brooks wandered through wide, grassy meadows, and in 1642 they petitioned the Court to grant this additional land to Concord because the best of the land had already given out. The petition was approved on condition that a settlement be made within two years. But Concord was at it lowest ebb and nothing was done so the land was forfeited. Again in 1650 a request was made and again it was granted. But Concord was just beginning to get on its feet and again no settlement was made. In 1653 the Court granted land for the settlement of Chelmsford and the same year John Eliot asked that his Praying Indians be given a township of their own to the west. Both of these encroached somewhat on the forfeited claim. By this time Concord had finally begun to prosper. Even faster than the increase in population had been increased in livestock. The meadowlands were inadequate and common pasture lands becoming overcrowded. Once more Concord eyed the meadow to the west. A complaint to the General Court about the encroachment of other grants brought the suggestion that the remaining lands be surveyed which was speedily done. The next year, 1655, 5000acres were given to Concord “for feeding”.
This time Concord made sure that it held onto its new land. Within a year the town's sheep - an animal not in daily use like cows and horses - were installed in the New grant in the care of a shepherd. None of the local histories makes this statement outright, but it seems a natural inference for a variety of reasons. It was for town pasturage that the land was granted to Concord and Fletcher in his Acton in History, comments that “the new grant land was granted to Concord and was familiarly called, and with some reason, `Concord's sheep pasture' “. Shattuck tells us that a settler was there by 1656. What was he doing there, on common land, unless he was performing a service for the town? Cutter in his “Middlesex County” remarks that this man John Law was known by the odd nickname of “Shepherd”. People used to be addressed by their calling - we are accustomed to hearing about Farmer Brown and Lawyer Jones - why not Shepherd Law? So it seems reasonable to assume that john Law was sent to the New grant by town people of Concord to look after their sheep. Who was John Law? Family tradition says that he was a Scot about 1635. Cutter suggests that probably that he came to Massachusetts as a prisoner of war.
After Charles I was beheaded in 1649, Oliver Cromwell devoted himself to wiping out areas of royal resistance. The Scottish Parliament had proclaimed Prince Charles, later Charles II, as their king and has called out the clans. They gathered at Dunbar on the east coast of Scotland, an unorganized horde, and each chief with his brave but untrained and poorly armed clansmen. Against them Cromwell sent the best soldiers in Europe, disciplined, efficient and well armed. The battle on Sept. 3, 1650 became a rout. Ten thousand were taken prisoner of whom about half were so disabled that they were released. Five thousand able-bodies prisoners were marched down to Durham where the Cathedral was turned into a prison. Conditions were appalling and sixteen hundred died. The Privy Council met hastily to determine what to do with them. Transportation of convicts as slave labor to the tobacco fields of Virginia was an established practice and about a thousand of the healthiest were sent off there. Many more went to Ireland. A Londoner who was interested in the establishment of a ironworks at Saugus, Massachusetts requested sixty men and a group of one hundred and fifty were sent to Boston on the ship Unity. No list of these deportees had been found. After a wintry, stormy voyage, those still alive and destined for the ironworks were sold off to the highest bidder. A large group went to Maine to work in the sawmills. There is an area in Berwick, Maine called Unity Parish (after the name of the ship which brought them over) where a number of these men settled when their terms of servitude were up. Another similar area in York is still called Scotland. Others of the prisoners were scattered through Massachusetts and the New Hampshire.
White slaves were something new to New England and some people had qualms about it. The Rev. John Cotton felt called upon to ease his conscience by writing Cromwell describing how well they were treated at Saugus. In a defensive tone he explained that this particular group was well fed, well clothed and comfortably housed and that they would be freed after about eight years of servitude. Cromwell couldn't have cared less.
Back in Scotland, Price Charles was still active and, organizing another army, they met Cromwell's troops at Worcester precisely a year to the day after Dunbar with exactly the same results. This time all the officer prisoners and every tenth private were executed for rebellion. About three hundred prisoners of war were sent to Massachusetts Bay in 1652. There is a record of the names of most of these, but the clerk had difficulty understanding the Scottish burr that the transcript cannot be considered accurate. No John Law is named in this second group. Concord is listed, however, as one of the towns to receive Scottish prisoners of war. An 1830 map of Concord has a section of town labeled Scotland and no one knows why. Perhaps there was a group pf these deportees who settled in the area. Whether John law came to Concord, as a prisoner of war must be considered a conjecture, but a strong probability. It seems also probable that he was experienced in the care of sheep, with an aptitude for successful care of sick animals. Scots were then generally viewed by the English as uncivilized, wild men. In the public records of the Bay colonies these prisoners were classed Negroes and Indians. The Scots have always been a proud race and to be treated with such disdain would be most galling to a man of spirit. Life alone in the wilderness where wolves, bears, wildcats and transient Indians roamed would frighten off many a man, but John Law may well have welcomed a chance to hold up his head like other men and forget his slavery among the animals he understood.
Being a chattel himself he could not own land and, of course, could not enter into any legal agreement so no written contact was executed. He was assigned certain lands for his use, and presumably - since all the lands remained in the town's ownership anyways - he was allowed to help in the selection of the site for the sheepfold he would build. He chose the bank of a small spring fed brook, which would furnish water for both him and the animals. Close to the border of the New Grant it flowed down to the grassy meadows and the great Brook, later called by his name, Law's Great Brook. The land rose rather steeply to the northwest and into this he could burrow out a shelter much as the early settlers of Concord did for their first homes. Nearby were the meadows where he could cut hay for the sheep. Here he lived alone except for his sheep and perhaps a dog for four lonely years.
In the spring of 1660 he married Lydia, daughter of Roger Draper of Concord. She was born in Concord in 1641, during the second year that records were kept there. A year later their son John was born, the first white chills born in what is now Acton, although at that time it was called Concord's New Grant.
In 1660 also, once again John law's life was affected by his historical events. Cromwell had died and England, in turmoil invited Charles II to return and occupy the throne. Suddenly Law was no longer a traitor who had rebelled against the government, he was a loyal subject to the king. Considering himself released from his bondage, he felt that some recompense was due him for what he had - wrongfully to his mind - undergone. He was penalized fro supporting the King, while those who had defied their rightful king were prospering. Full ownership of the land he lad cleared was little enough compensation. Some townsmen were in sympathy with him, but others were more literal - nothing had ever been said about giving him the land. Presumably also, the man who had laid out money on his purchase price thought that he should at least get his investment back. This controversy posed a real problem for the Concord people, which went on for many years.
In 1661 another change came into John Law's life when he acquired a neighbor. John Shepherd of Concord had met with ah accident and lost an arm. The town seems to feel some responsibility towards him - perhaps he had been working out his taxes on the road or building a bridge - and it voted in town meeting, to grant him thirty acres in the New Grant “in consideration of the hand of God upon him in the loss of one of his arms”. He was given land near the old Concord town line just to the north of the area where Law was living. He was the first landowner of Acton to settle on his property and his name always comes first in any mention of the early settlers. He built his house upstream from Law beside the same little brook. It was taken down or burned about 1850 and even the cellarhole disappeared about 1960 when the land was graded for a development. Already married when he came, his wife had a son john, born that same year, nine months after John Law, Jr.
For eight years more the two families were the only recorded settlers of Acton. There may have been transient woodcutters, or possibly even families, on the Ironworks farm property in what is now South Acton, but nothing is known of them. John Law remained on the sheep farm. Probably he continued for a time to serve as town shepherd with the differences that now the owners of the sheep paid him rather than his former master. Payment was undoubtedly “in kind” - grain or other food, or perhaps a spring lamb he had nurtured. In this way he could build up a flock of his own. His family grew too. After John Jr. in 1661 came Thomas in 1663 Steven in 1665, two girls Elizabeth and Mary and Samuel in 1680.
The earliest records in Concord were kept in cheap paper books, which became so worn that in 1664 the town voted to buy new leather covered book into which would be copied “what is useful in the old book”. Not much was considered “useful” and we have thereby lost much information on what went on in the early days. It is possible, however to do some reading between the lines. It would seem that it was proposed that Law be allowed to remain as a tenant of the town under a annual rent of “one Indian corn” to be paid on town meeting day. It would also seem that John Law was stubborn and considering himself a proprietor rather than a tenant, and no rent was paid. In 1672 those who were opposed to him pushed through a vote “to let out the land & housing where now John Law dwells; for the benefit of the town”. Later at the same meeting the more moderate element, feeling that this was too harsh, prevailing upon the townsmen to instruct the selectmen to be lenient towards Law.
In 1669 he had acquired another neighbor. The town commons of Concord were so overcrowded it had been decided to send the dry cows to the New Grant in the care of a herdsman. Capt. Thomas Wheeler undertook this project. Concord had learned something through its controversy with Law. This time the arrangement was to be carefully spelled out and recorded in black and white. It was made quite clear that the land was only leased, and that after a period of twenty years, it was to be returned to the town along with the buildings that Wheeler was instructed to erect on it. He was assigned land to the north of Shepherd's grant, and the description mentions Shepherd's house, “the house now inhabited by john Law”' a bridge and Law's fenced pasture. Wheeler did not live to complete his contract with the town. Six years later King Philips War broke out, and both he and his son were so wounded in an engagement at Brookfield that both died within the year.
The next year was a time of much uneasiness. Lancaster was attacked that same summer, also some of the Connecticut valley towns. Nearer home settlers were killed in Framingham. During the winter Lancaster was attacked again and abandoned. On the western edge of Concord's New grant near Lake Nagog two Shepard brothers - not related to John Shepherd mentioned earlier - were killed by the Indians and their sister captured. The Praying Indians of Nashoba were moved to Concord for their own protection. In the spring it was Groton's turn, then Marl borough's, and in April there was an attack in Sudbury. During all this the Law and Shepherd families stayed on unprotected and unharmed. Gradually the fighting moved into Maine and in August Philip was killed, after which the war dwindled away. There was a general burst of colonization towards the west after King Philip's War, and it may have been at this time that Concord gave up the idea of keeping its New Grant as pastureland and allow settlers to move in.
Gov. Andros' arrival in 1686 was the signal for much turmoil about land titles. He claimed that the colony's General Court has no right to grant land, and that purchase from the Indians lad no validity whatsoever. In 1689 Concord's selectmen complied a list of all those who, though not free men entitled to vote in colony affairs, were, nevertheless, accredited landowners. John Shepherd is on this list, but not john Law. While the land ownership problem were still unsolved word came that William of Orange had driven James II from the throne with the backing of England's Protestants. Andos was jailed and sent back to England. King William upheld the actions of the General Court and all Massachusetts landowners once more breathed freely. Nine years later in 1698, a committee was “chosen by the town of Concord to determine a list of the proprietors of the New Grant otherwise known as Concord Village”. The first name is that of John Barker, Jr. upon the account of John Shepherd, Sr. who had died. Next comes John Law. After forty years persistence had paid off, and the town was finally willing to admit his claim. Ten years later John was dead.
John Jr. was dead also. The next two sons, Thomas and Steven, although in there fifties, were still living at home unmarried. Elizabeth was married and Mary soon to be. Samuel, the youngest, had become a doctor. It would be interesting to know where he had obtained his training. Perhaps he practiced first on his father's sheep, then, finding he had an aptitude for healing, branched out to work on people. He married, following his father's death, then three years later, sold his house built a cross the little brook from his father and moved to Groton, Conn. There he died in 1727 from a dose of fresh physic just received from Boston, but apparently adulterated.
John Law made a will Dec. 13, 1707, “being sick of body but of perfect mind and memory” It is in the handwriting of Samuel Buttrick, one of the witnesses, but was dictated by Law and proofread with occasional insertions for classification. He signed it himself, very legibly, with an elegant flourish to the capital J. He commits his soul to God and his body to the earth “hoping that both soul and body shall be glorified together with my Blessed Redeemer forever. And as for the outward estate which God hath given me I so dispose in manner following __”. I am quoting rather fully because his reverent and dignified attitude are so at variance with the characteristics Phalen in his History of Acton imputes to him - “avarice, shiftlessness, laziness, stupidity, carelessness and contentiousness”. We know that John law was stubborn, proud and held himself aloof from outsiders, but he was also brave, hard working and devoted to his family. We have no need to be ashamed of the character of our first settler. Phalens seems to have a violent prejudice against the Law family, apparently based on a misunderstanding of Law's determination to hold fast to his home. In the will Law goes on to provided fro “my beloved wife” by giving her most of the movables in the house, including a bed and bedding, a horse, cow and heifer, also the sole use of his orchard for life. The last would provide her with an independent income for necessary purchases. Thomas, the oldest remaining son, was to have the land south of the road and help maintain “his honored mother”. Steven was to have the home place and land on the north of the road and the maintenance of his mother for her lifetime. Dr. Samuel had already built across the little brook and was given the five acres his house stood on. There is no sign of the location of this house now. Mary, the daughter at home, was to have a large brass kettle. When it was sold, she was to give Elizabeth twenty shillings out of the proceeds. Law seems to have had the European attitude that girls were of little importance compared to sons. A very through appraisal of his effects was made, even to listing two water pails worth two shillings. Other interesting items were printed books valued at a pound, pewter, a sword and cutlass and table linens valued at a pound. In the barn there were four sheep, as well as horses, cows and a steer. Altogether in the house there were twenty three yards of linsey woolsey cloth, half of it dyed and pressed, also twelve pounds of wool ready for spinning, which seems like a lot to have around the house for moths to work on. Did he, perhaps, like many Scots even now, combine the occupations of sheep raising and weaving? Was Mary's brass kettle his dye kettle? Lydia, his beloved wife must then have been an expert spinner and we are presented with a pleasant picture of a snowy day with the sheep snug in the barn, Lydia sitting by the glowing fireplace making her spinning wheel hum, while John sat at his loom in the corner, swinging his beater with a thump. His total estate was valued at 150 pounds, which was about average for the period, and rather good for a man who had started with nothing.
Thomas built a house on his lot across the road, and about 1711 brought his bride Sarah ---. They had six children. Steven also married, but he and his wife Deborah - - had no children. His nephew took over the house after his death, and the two houses stayed in the Law family for many years. During the Revolutionary there were six members of the Law family in Acton who served in the army. Ruben Law was one of those Minutemen who marched with Isaac Davis to North Bridge on April 19, 1775. Later he fought at Bunker Hill. There is an amusing story about Reuben. In those days men wore their hair long. Gentlemen tied it back with a ribbon, but farmers and artisans more generally braided their in a queue. At bunker Hill Reuben's queen was shot clear away which Reuben describes as “plaguey careless shooting”. About 1820 the house on the south side of the road passed out of the law family, and in 1848 John's house. Or a later one built on the same site, also changed hands. There are now no families by the name of Law in Acton. One early member moved to Stow and may have left descendants there. The telephone book lists two families under Maynard and one in Hudson. Law girls married into the Read, Davis, Wood, Gate, Emerson and Brown families so without much doubt, there are still in Acton people in whose veins flow the blood Acton's first settler.
Notes From the History of Acton
complied by REV. Franklin P. Wood.
The whole or a portion of the territory now included in the limits of Acton, within the period of authentic history, has been subject to four different local jurisdictions.
First it was, as first discovered by the white people, the property of the Massachusetts Indians, under the rule of Naneposhemet, the great sachem of this tribe, whose principal residence was in Medford, near Mystic Pond. His house was built on a large scaffold six feet high, and on the top of a hill. This chief was killed in 1619, by a warlike tribe of Eastern Indians, and his widow, as a squaw sachem, "succeeded to all his power and influence. Her power was very much dreaded by the neighboring tribes; and, when the first whites came to Plymouth, the sachems of Boston and Neponset desired their protection against her. She at length married Wibbacowitts, the powwow priest; and he became the sachem in her right, and was in power at the time of the purchase of Musketaquid (Concord) by the whites. The local sachem of the place was Tohattawan. The ample ponds and streams, bordered by open meadows, where the squaws could easily raise the maize, made this quite a- favorite dwelling-place for the Indians. It is supposed that this tribe, occupying the land north of Charles River and east of Massachusetts Bay, at one time could muster three thousand warriors; but, about 1633, nearly nine-tenths of the whole tribe died from smallpox. Arrow- heads have been found upon Luther Conant's farm, upon J. E. Cutter's plain, and in various parts of the town, which are relics of this period in our history.
The second jurisdiction of the town has reference only to a small portion of it, in the vicinity of Nagog Pond. Tohattawan, the son of the local sachem above mentioned, was one of the first Indian converts of John Eliot; and he and many of his people desired a certain fixed tract of land secured to them in the vicinity of what was then known as Nashobah, land now principally within the limits of Littleton; and, on May 14, 1654, this request was granted, and that portion of our town, with the other land specified, being a tract four miles square, was incorporated as the sixth praying Indian town, under Colonial government.
As there were only about twenty families in this plantation, when it was at its best, and as it was principally in the present limits of Littleton, we only refer to this period in connection with the history of our town.
The third jurisdiction refers to our territory when it was Concord's new grant.
The early settlers of Concord complained that they found their lands, contrary to their expectations, very poorly adapted to purposes of agriculture. The low lands were too frequently overflowed and constantly too wet for their crops, while the high lands were so light that the crops upon them were parched by the drought; so that, unless they could be assisted by some new grants of land which still belonged to the public domain, they feared the new plantation would have to be abandoned.
In response to this petition, additional land was granted them down the river; and in 1650 they were granted another large tract, which must have contained ten thousand
acres, and which was the territory now comprised in the town of Acton. By their failure to improve this land, they temporarily lost some of it, and their title to any part of it. But we find that in May 1655, they were again granted five thousand acres for feeding purposes, according to their petition, provided it hinder not any other grants
Up to 1706 there seems to have been much confusion about the bounds of the new grant, and at that date a com- mission was appointed to renew and fix them. These bounds, as renewed, began where the present south-east corner of Acton meets with Concord and Sudbury, and ran nearly on the present line, separating Acton, Maynard, Stow, Boxboro, and Littleton, until it comes to the, westerly end of N agog Pond, and from thence up to the line of Chelmsford, toward Tagnack (near the old Hartwell tavern in Westford); from thence, the line ran easterly to the north part of Virginia Meadow, in Carlisle, and thence to Berry Comer and by Concord bounds to the place first mentioned.
A plan of this tract of land was made by Captain Stephen Hosmer in 1730, and it then contained 12,986 acres, exclusive of Major Willard's farm, which finally became a part of this town.
These lands were supposed to be the property of the freeholders of Concord, or of those who owned a house and improved lands; and their proper division were for many years a matter of debate, and probably, at times, was the occasion of much bitterness of feeling on the part of the different classes who laid claim to the land.
The division was finally agreed upon May 17, 1728, in the following way: -"
" Whereas it bas been voted and agreed that all the rights in the village (the new grant) should be laid out into ten-acre lots, twenty-acre lots, and thirty-acre lots, so that every free- hold that consisted of a dwelling-house and improved land in 1661 should draw thirty acres, and every freehold that was so in 1684 have twenty acres, and every freehold that was so in 1615 have ten acres, but since thought better to lay it out into bigger lots, namely, one-hundred-acre lots, so that every ten single rights may draw one of the one- hundred-acre lots ; and where it so happens that those that have but ten-acre lots, or those that have not ten of those single rights to draw cannot agree to join ten of them together to draw one of those one-hundred-acre lots,- it shall be in the power of the committee to join them and draw for them, or to appoint somebody to draw; and, if they cannot agree to subdivide, the committee shall subdivide it at the charge of the propriety."
It was in this way that the land was divided. Before this division, the grasslands of the grant had been utilized under the direction of the selectmen or a committee of the free- holders, so that the original purpose for which the land had been desired had been carried out.
The following is a specimen of the way in which it is probable most of the land was disposed of. In 1668, the town leased to Captain Thomas Wheeler for twenty years two hundred acres of uplands near Mr. Charles Williams' present residence, and sixty acres of meadow lying upon Nashoba Brook, on condition that he should keep, except twelve Sabbath days yearly (probably twelve weeks), a herd of fifty cattle for one shilling per head, for the inhabitants to be paid one-third part in wheat, one-third part in rye or pease, and the other third part in Indian corn. They were to be constantly watched by a herdsman, and kept in a yard at night to protect them from the wild beasts. Captain Wheeler agreed to build a house 40X18, and 12 stud, covered with shingles, and to have a pair of chimneys and a barn 46x'24, and 12 high-all to be left £or the use of the town at the expiration 0£ his lease. I t was probably by some such arrangement as this that white settlers first came into this territory to live. The following families may have begun their residence within these limits at this time: Law, Wooly, Cutting, Prescott, White, Brooks, Robbins, Davis, Chaffin, Fletcher, Jones, Crain, Shepherd, and Wright. It is probably the case that, until the formal division of the land above mentioned, in 1728, the population of the town was sparse, as the land was held only upon lease, and there would be no encouragement to permanent improvements.
Probably from 1728 to 1735, the present territory of the town was settled very rapidly, and it is likely that quite a number of the families like the Fletchers and Hayward's came from Concord. The recently acquired lands, conveniently divided into upland and meadow, presented to parents excellent facilities for the settlement of their newly married sons and daughters.
The fourth jurisdiction refers to the town in its present condition, as a regularly incorporated municipality by itself.
In 1731, a petition was presented to the town of Concord by the inhabitants of the new grant or village, to be set off as a precinct; but it did not prevail, and three similar subsequent petitions met with the same fate. But on March 4, 1734, at a meeting of the inhabitants of this part of Concord, it was voted " to set off the village or town's new grant a separate town, together with Major Willard's farm, and that the inhabitants and proprietors petition the General Court for a sanction.”
In response to this petition, the following act of incorporation was passed July 3, 1735, one hundred years after the incorporation of Concord, the" mother town: -
" Whereas the inhabitants and proprietors of the north- westerly part of Concord, in the County of Middlesex, called the Village or New Grant, have represented to this court that they labor under great difficulties by reason of their remoteness from public worship, and therefore desire that they and their estates, together with the farms called Willard Farms, may be set off a distinct and separate township, for which they have also obtained the consent of the town of Concord,
" Be it therefore enacted by his Excellency the Governor, Council, and Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, that the said north- westerly part of Concord, together with the said farms, be and hereby are set off, constituted, and erected into a separate township by the name of Acton, and agreeably to the following boundaries (substantially the same as those given of the new grant in 1706); and that the inhabitants of the lands before described and bounded be and hereby are vested with the town privileges and immunities that the in- habitants of the other towns within this province are or by law ought to be vested with.
" Provided that the said town of Acton do, within three years from the publication of this act, erect and finish a suitable house for the worship of God, and procure and settle a learned orthodox minister of good conversation, and make provision for his comfortable and honorable support."
John Heald, the ancestor of the Healds of Carlisle, was authorized by the General Court to call a town meeting for the election of necessary officers and for the transaction of all necessary business.
Mr. Heald is spoken of as one of the principal citizens of Acton. He was moderator of the first town meeting, was elected chairman of the board of selectmen and assessors, and held other important offices. The names of Wheeler, Barker, Billings, Hosmer, Parlin, Davis, Jones, Hayward, Tuttle, Faulkner, and Fletcher, frequently appear in the early annals of the town.
One of the first and most important things to be settled by the town was the location of the meetinghouse. " Where shall the meeting-house place be? " has been at two epochs one of the most vexed questions that our citizens have been called upon to decide. I t was necessary to fix upon a location for the proposed house as soon as possible, not simply because it must be erected within a certain specified time, but because it would determine the location of most of the roads in town. As all the roads of the Roman Empire led toward Rome, so all the roads of a New England town at first led to the " meeting-house place."
At length, after months of discussion and many meetings, held out of doors, it was decided to build the house upon a" knowl " near the centre of the town, the site of the present centre school-house
After locating the meetinghouse the citizens devoted themselves with commendable earnestness to the construction of roads and bridle paths. The highways, in comparison with our broad, well kept roads, were rude affairs; but no one can read our town records of the early time without being impressed with the tremendous exertions which the fathers had to put forth to make them what they were. Until 1743, each man \vas obliged to go upon the roads and work out his own tax, or furnish a substitute; but in that year it was voted that the work upon the roads should be done by a rate, so that a man could pay a certain sum of money instead of furnishing the work; and until about 1870 that continued to be the practice of the town. Since then, all the taxes have been in money, and the work upon the highways has been by commissioners, instead of by district surveyors; and we think the present system gives complete satisfaction.
The next thing, which occupied the serious attention of the inhabitants of the town, was the actual erection of the meetinghouse. On a certain day in May 1736, all the men of the town who had a mind to work met upon the designated " knowl," and worked from 8 A.M. to the going down of the sun, putting in the foundations of the house of God. Though some, it seems, did not appear upon the appointed day for the above purpose, and they were doomed by their fellows to work an extra day upon the highways,
Later, it was voted that all the inhabitants should have the opportunity to furnish lumber for the new house. This privilege was probably improved, and almost every-farm had something in the materials of God's house. A good idea!
In January 1738, the house was so far completed that public worship could be held in it.
The following is a brief description of the interior of the house: Most of the audience-room was filled with simple seats of unpainted boards. Only the part of the house next the walls was reserved for pews. This was called " the pew ground." The disposal of the seats was left to a committee whose duty it was to " seat the meeting-house " at certain, specified times. It was a free seat system, but with such an arrangement that each person had a specified place. In the disposal of the seats, the committee usually bad reference to age and the amount 0£ taxes paid by the individuals during the three preceding years. The men were arranged on the right and the women on the left of the pulpit, both in the body of the house and in the gallery. There were, leading up into the gallery, " the men's-stairs " and " the women's stairs."
The proper disposal of the " pew ground " seems to have been a vexed question. Did our space permit; we would like to make some quotations from the old records touching this point. At first, the space for pews seems to have been assigned to those who paid the highest rates or taxes; later, they were sold at auction to the highest bidders. In all cases, the persons who had the pew ground were obliged to build their own pews, and to plaster to the girt. The owner- ship of pews was considered desirable from the fact that
such persons could sit together by families. Several pew- holders from time to time procured the consent of the town to make windows for their own convenience. They were not limited as to size or position. The only condition was that they should keep them repaired. It was in this way the small windows near the corners came to be.
Having secured a house of worship, the next thing, both to fulfill the people's desire and the conditions of their act of incorporation, was to secure " a learned orthodox minister of good conversation."
To further this end, a day of fasting and prayer, with appropriate religious services, was kept in March 1738 and in the following Maya unanimous invitation to become their minister was extended to John Swift, a graduate of Harvard University, and a Native of Framingham
Mr. Swift served the town as a minister until his death. During the year 177 5, the smallpox was very prevalent in this town. Rev. Mr. Swift was among its victims, and died, in consequence of it, November 7, of that year. Deacon Samuel Hosmer has Mr. Swift's church record book. It indicates that its author, though well versed in Latin, was very eccentric. From what we can learn, however, we judge him to have been in every respect such a minister as the legislature in its act 0£ incorporation instructed the town to secure.
The next thing, which occupied the attention of the town, was a provision for the education of the children and youth. In 1741, the first town school was kept. This year, "a reading, writing, and moving school" was supported for six months. In 1743, £3 was appropriated for a similar purpose. Most of the educational discipline in this period was in the families or from the minister. In 1760, the town was divided into six school districts, and in 1771 into seven. In 1797, the town was divided into four districts, and several new houses were built. This division prevailed about fifty years, when the present one took its place, though the regu1ar district system was abolished several years ago. We have the names of about twenty-five natives of Acton who have received a 1iberal education. .
Another matter, which, almost at the commencement of our history, had to occupy the attention of the town, was the care of the poor. For many years, it was the custom of the town to board the poor out to the lowest bidders. This being so, these unfortunate persons had no settled place of abode, but were constantly drifting about from one to an- other, and were often subject to neglect or abuse. For instance, there appears in the record the name of a widow Trow, who was dependent upon the town for support. Her name occurs so frequently that the clerk often calls her " Trow), as an abbreviation. I have been informed that this woman suffered from a malady, which made her offensive to those who cared for her, and the town found it difficult to find any one who would consent to provide for her wants.
It appears from the record, however, that even in the last century there were those who advocated the present excellent method of caring for the aged and other poor. Our town farm was virtually a present from the national government, as it was purchased with the money, which the town received as its portion of surplus revenue.
In 1794 the number of those dependent upon the town for support was quite large, and a measure of possible relief was resorted to which in these times would seem extremely harsh and unjust. The town instructed the constable to warn fourteen families out of her limits, some of- whom had been in town a considerable length of time. These persons had committed no crime; they were good and law-abiding citizens, but were poor, and might possibly become a charge to the town; and so, under the pretext that they had entered the town without her consent, they were warned to leave, within fifteen days. It is well for those who wail over the present age as regards the treatment of the poor, and who accuse it of misanthropy generally, to turn their attention to the past.
Under the date of March 21, 1744, it is recorded that the town voted to procure powder and bullets as a town stock. Under a later date is an order for money to replenish the town's stock of ammunition. These records show that the town was, in a sense, a military organization from almost the commencement of its history. The first war in which the citizens of the town had any part was the French and Indian War (1748-1763). Just \V hat part Acton had in this war, it is impossible to state, as the men who-engaged in it were volunteers, and the town \vas not called upon to take any action in its corporate capacity. There is a tradition that Captain Gershom Davis led a company in this war, and that near its close Captain J. Robbins led out another company. .
The next war in which the men of Acton took a prominent part was that of the Revolution.
As early as the twenty-first of December, 1767, the town voted to comply with the proposals by theTown of Boston relating to the encouraging 0£ manufactures among ourselves, and not purchasing of superfluities abroad. On the fifth of March 1770, the town entered into an agreement not to purchase or use foreign merchandise or tea.
Dec. 21, 1772, the state of public affairs was brought before the town, and a committee of nine 0£ the principal citizens was appointed to take it into consideration, and recommend to the town what action ought to be taken in the premises. Their report and the subsequent action of the town show that Acton was abreast of the other towns in patriotism.
What Acton had to do with the ever-memorable events of the nineteenth of April 1775, is now so well known that we need not describe it. Its most enviable place in American history is now an assured fact.
In June, 1776, Deacon Mark White, Acton's representative in the General Court, received the following from his constituents: " The subverting of our Constitution, the many injuries and unheard-of barbarities which these Colonies have received from Great Britain, confirm us in the opinion that the present age will be deficient in their duty to God, their posterity, and themselves, should they not form an American Republic. This is the only form of government, which we wish to see established. But we mean not to dictate. We freely submit this interesting affair to the wisdom of the honorable Continental Congress, who, we trust, are guided in this important affair by the supreme Governor of the world. And we instruct you, sir, to give them the strongest assurance that, if they should declare America to be a free, independent republic, your constituents will support and defend the measure with their lives and fortunes."
We have a list of one hundred and eighty names of Acton citizens who had a part in the war of the Revolution, and there were probably others who are not known.
Thomas Thorp, who was in Captain Davis' company, went through the whole war. The town had the honor of furnishing several officers during the war. Lieutenant. Colonel Francis Faulkner and Captain Simon Hunt were in the battle of White Plains, and at other times were in actual service. Lieutenant-Colonel Faulkner commanded the regiment, which guarded the prisoners who were taken at the surrender of Burgoyne and carried to Cambridge.
In the war of 1812, Acton had ten or twelve enlisted men; and a company called " Davis Blues " went to Boston to defend that city against an apprehended attack.
The part, which Acton had in the recent civil war, has been so frequently and favorably dwelt upon on public occasions of late that we make only a brief reference to it, to make our sketch more complete.
At the time of the outbreak of the Rebellion, there was in Acton a finely drilled and exceedingly patriotic company of soldiers called the " Davis Guards," under the command of Captain Daniel Tuttle.
This company, with an expedition unsurpassed by any military organization in the country, was among the first to hasten to the defense of the capitol; and, as a part of the old Sixth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers, displayed the same heroism in the streets of Baltimore that their fathers had shown at Concord, eighty-six years before: To show the state of feeling in Acton at the outbreak of this war, we give an extract from a letter of Ron. John Fletcher to Captain Tuttle, dated April 21, four days after the guards left town: "Our citizens are alive with enthusiasm and praise of the company and of the readiness with which they responded to the call to march. Acton receives compliments from all sources on account of the guards. Many in town who have not been favorable to the military are wide-awake and ready to vote for any appropriation that may be needed for the company and their families. Tell the guards not to borrow a moment's trouble with reference to the wants of their families, as we are to have a meeting on Saturday especially for the purpose of making an appropriation as a contingent fund, to be applied as needed for the comfort of their families. We keep the flag flying from the monument, and intend to until the guards return. Rev. Mr. Morton made allusion to the company in his morning prayer, which brought tears from his own and most of his hearers' eyes. The guards have the prayers and best wishes of all. Tell the boys to keep up good courage and take good aim when in sight of the enemy. God bless you.”
When the guards returned, they received a grand ovation, and they and their families were given a public dinner. Acton furnished one hundred and ninety-five men for the service during this war, and twenty of these were commissioned officers.
Acton has inaugurated and participated in several important celebrations. April 19, 1825, she united with Concord in celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Concord Fight. Colonel W. E. Faulkner commanded a company upon this occasion, which did great credit to the town. July 21, 1835, the town celebrated her centennial with an address by Josiah Adams, Esq., a public dinner, and in other appropriate ways.
In October 1852, the monument was dedicated with imposing ceremonies. Governor Boutwell delivered the ad- dress and Rev. John Pierpont contributed a poem.
April 19, 1875, Acton united with Concord and Lexington in the celebration of the day.
For the Concord celebration, Acton furnished a company of Minute Men, under the command of Captain A. C. Handley, whose fine appearance elicited much praise.
Acton, MA. - The Colonial Years
A Brief History of Acton, pages 12-17
Copyright - Acton Historical Society, Acton Mass. 1974
Acton, at its incorporation in 1735, was bounded by Sudbury, Concord, Billerica, Chelmsford, Littleton, and Stow. Within Acton's borders was a major portion of what was to become Carlisle in 1804.
There is no record of why the town was given the name of Acton. However there is an Acton in Middlesex County, England. Since the names of many English place had already been adopted for other New England towns, it may be assumed that such was the case with Acton.
The building of a meetinghouse was the first order of business to come before the new town. With John Heald, Jr. as moderator, the first town meeting was held in October 1735. The warrant asked, “to see if the town will begin to build a meeting house this year and what way they will do it in.” The article failed, but in December it was voted to build a house 46' by 36' on the site now known as Meeting House Hill in Acton Center at the corner of Main Street and Nagog Hill Road.
The meetinghouse was in use by 1738 but not finished until 1747. One of its architectural oddities was several small windows in the corners of the building. Each pew holder complaining of a lack of light was given permission to cut his own window. Each seemed to have cut an opening of a different size at a different level.
The first minister was Reverend John Swift, a native of Framingham and a graduate of Harvard. He became pastor in November 1738 and served until his death in November 1775. As was the custom, Reverend Swift supplemented his living by taking in boys to prepare them for college.
Schooling was a matter of early and important concern. By 1647, towns with 50 families were obliged to keep a common school. The law of the time required “all children and youth, under family government, to be taught to read perfectly in the English tongue, have knowledge in the capital law and be taught some orthodox catechism, and that they be brought up to some honest employment.”
Although a school was held as early as 1733 in the Faulkner House the first article concerning establishment of schools in Acton was on the warrant of March 3, 1740. It was not until 1743 that money was voted for the purpose, however. One article provided for reading, writing and moving schools. Under this system, school was kept at one district for a short period, probably six weeks, and then the schoolmaster moved on to the next district.
The moving schools were subsequently replaced by four schoolhouses built by private funds. In 1771 the town itself paid for a schoolhouse in the Center and within a year, purchased the school buildings then existing in the north, east, south and west of Acton.
Burying grounds were another necessity. It has been assumed, probably incorrectly, that Acton's first cemetery was the North cemetery at the northeastern edge of town. How early this ground was used is unknown, since the earliest graves are unmarked. But the location was certainly too remote for most of the community. In 1737 Nathan Robbins sold a half an acre of his land to the town for one pound. This was beginning of Woodlawn Cemetery, where the earliest markers still standing are dated 1743. In 1774 the original area and an additional small tract given Joseph Robbins in 1769 were fenced, the townspeople being assessed the cost. Exemption was made for those citizens living in the northeast part of town since they had already built a stonewall around their burying ground.
Small industry had its start in Acton during these early years. Saw mills and grist mills were necessities, and there were several in town. The area near Main and School Street was known as Mill Corner since there have been mills at the site since 1701. Along Nashoba Brook there were at least four mills. The northernmost was at the end of Wheeler Lane where, in 1738, there stood a dwelling house, barn, grist mill, and saw mill.
Barrels were needed for the storing of cider, beef, pork, fish, and staples. Cooperage became a popular small business. As a result a “Culler of Shingles and Staves” was elected by the town in 1757 to assure that those commodities were of proper quality, particularly when sold out-of-town.
Acton was not an isolated community. It was part of the whole colonial pictures. Although the record of Acton participation in the French and Indian War of 1753-1763 is meager, there is evidence that as many as three companies of militia may have been involved. (Under colonial law, every town was required to have a trained militia. The companies belonged to the Crown, technically.) During the various campaigns, three Acton men James and Samuel Brabrook and Benjamin Allen lost their lives. Captain Daniel Fletcher was wounded and taken prisoner.
It was in 1767 that a sequence of events began to take shape which was to cause the ultimate break with England. In June of that year the British parliament established taxes on glass, painter's colors and tea, such taxes to be collected at the port of Boston. British ships of war were sent to Boston to insure the peaceful collection of these taxes. Then the Royal Governor dismissed the general Court and gave authorization for British soldiers to be billeted among the townspeople. The strained relations resulting from these culminated in the Boston town meeting sponsoring a convention of all surrounding towns, to be held at Faneuil Hall.
Acton had, in its earliest years, considered sending a representative to the General Court but had never done so. In 1767, however, they elected Captain Daniel Fletcher to be their first representative to the Court. When the Boston town meeting called its convention, Fletcher was again chosen to represent Acton.
Over the ensuing years, the estrangement between the Crown and the colonies grew, In October 1772, Boston organized a Committee of Correspondence to set forth the rights of the colonist, to point out infringements made on these rights, to inform the several towns of this state of affairs, and to invite support from those towns.
In response to the letter sent by Committee of Correspondence to Acton, a special town meeting was held on December 21, 1772 when a committee was appointed to draft a reply. Acton's reply took note of the alarming violations of the colonists' charter rights and privileges, and petitioned for the removal of Governor Thomas Hutchison who personified their grievances.
The argument concerning the landing of tea and the tax thereon raged through the summer and fall of 1773 and culminated in the Boston Tea Party of December 1773. This event more than any other seemed to be the catalyst that precipitated the colonists' resistance to taxation without representation. Town meeting were held in many communities including Acton, to pass resolutions condemning actions of the Crown.
By late summer of 1774 the colonists were becoming more active in the defense of their liberties as they saw them. On August 30 a convention of neighboring towns met in Concord. Acton sent three delegates to this meeting, which passed 19 resolutions bearing on the grievances of the colonies. The spirit of the convention is embodied in the concluding paragraph of the accepted document: “ And if in support of our rights, we are called on to encounter even death, we are yet undaunted, sensible that he can never die to soon, who lays down his life in support of the laws and liberties of his country.”
On October 3, 1774 a special town meeting was called in which the town of Acton took three important steps. Josiah Hayward was elected to the General Court if and when the Governor dared to call it into session. Francis Faulkner and Ephraim Hapgood were chosen as Acton delegates to a Provincial Congress to be held in Concord the second Tuesday in October.
A provincial Congress was, in the eyes of the Crown, illegal. In the eyes of the colonists, it was their right to meet as a political body, particularly important since the Governor showed no signs of permitting the General Court to sit.
Five representatives were elected as a Committee of Correspondence for the town. October 3 marks the day Acton casts its lot against the Crown. It is today celebrated in Acton as Crown Resistance Day.
Shortly after this meeting, a mass meeting was held on Concord common. At this meeting a committee was chosen with Robert Chaffin of Acton as chairman. Every person suspected of being a Tory was compelled to appear before the committee for “trial”. An ordeal known as “humbling the Tories” was applied to those guilty of supporting the Crown against the rights of the colonists.
The carrying of arms was the inevitable next step.
In November of 1774 a company of minutemen was organized in Acton by voluntary enlistment. Isaac Davis, a gunsmith by trade was elected captain.
In December, Acton voted that its tax money should be paid out only at the order of the Selectmen and that the town would “defend and Save Harmless the Assessors” for their not making return to the Crown's tax collector.
Lines of colonial resistance were being drawn. It would not be long before Captain Isaac Davis and his gallant men would march to the Old North Bridge in Concord for their date with history.
Upon Which His Descendents Live In Independence
By Robert Nylander
Assabet Valley BEACON, Thursday, June 28, 1973
Acton in 1776 was an isolated town - a hill town nestled, in the ridge of Middlesex County as it climbs upward toward Wachusett and Monadnock. Visitors described it as "wild", (but then the main highways went through the least settled parts).
It was a small town and it grew slowly. Population in 1776 was 769, in 1790, 853, an average increase of only 6 persons a year in 14 years. These people constituted 100 families living in 96 homes in 1765; in 1771 there were 104 houses; and in 1798, 140 families living in 120 houses. All the people were primarily fanners, but several were specialists in some housewright, joiner, shoemaker, bricklayer, coffin maker- which trades they practiced as needed by their neighbors or on a rainy day.
To supply relief from the drudgery of every day existence and of trying to scratch up a living from the sandy and rocky soil, there were three taverns. Jones' tavern at Mill Corner was the longest established (1750). Brooks Tavern (licensed 1772) by the meeting house served the central part of town, and along the Great Road was another, whose location varied - in 1776 it was kept by Ebenezer White at the Pond Home, site of Nagog Hotel; by 1791 it was in a house that stood where 274 Great Road is now.
There were also 3 retailers of liquor, the equivalent of the modern pack_ store - one was run by Edward Wetherbee in the house at 75 Great Road that was recently removed to Harris Street to make way for its modern successor, the Colonial Wine Shop. (The location of the other two is not certain.)
The centre of the town was at the Meeting House on the Common, but the commercial centre, if it could be dignified by that designation, was Mill Corner (now South Acton), where Jones' saw mill and Faulkner's fulling mill had been operating since 1702, and had been expanded with the addition of Jones' cooperage and cider mill. Elsewhere in town were other mills that operated for a few years and then were abandoned; having served the demands they were built to serve.
Only one great highway went through the town, the Great Road, on its way to New Hampshire.
Until 1775, Acton had been pretty much isolated among its hills. It evidently felt so little a part of Province affairs that it was 1768 before it elected a deputy to represent it in the Great and General Court of Massachusetts. After a gap of 6 years, in 1774 another representative was elected, Josiah Hayward, and he was reelected in 1775.
When the funeral was held for Isaac Davis and his two soldiers, no one in Acton could have envisioned that the battle in which they died was to be the beginning of a new era; that what began as a civil war against the tyranny of the country's governma.'1t was soon to be declared a revolution to free the colonies entirely of that government's rule and to found a distinct new nation.
The temper of thought of the first four months is indicated in the epitaph on Isaac Davis' slate gravestone: "slain... in the defense of just rights and liberties of his country, civil and religious..."
These are reasons that are often given as a source of civil war.
One immediate symptom of the change and unrest that always accompanies War was the refugees that were fleeing the British occupation of Boston to find heroes in the surrounding towns. How many of these came to Acton is not known, as only a few of their names can be gathered from various sources.
One was Mrs. Elizabeth Bentley, whose husband, Joshua Bentley, had started Paul Revere on his famous ride by rowing him across the Charles River. She was received into the home of the William Cuttings, whose house is now number 88 Prospect Street. Mrs. Bentley's Boston neighbors, the Ruggles, or at least some of their family, also came out to Acton. They were not strangers to the town, as Mrs. Ruggles, sister to Major Daniel Fletcher, was born in the Faulkner house and she and her husband had spent the first years of their married life in the little old cottage that formerly studs near 49 Parker Street. Whether they also stayed with the Cuttings, or in someone else's home, is not known, but in 1777 their daughter Elizabeth married William Cuttings, so what was intended to be only a temporary sojourn in Acton became life long.
Another Bostonian was Josiah Williston, who was married to Polly Connery in Acton in 1776. One of the "Indians" of the Boston Tea Party, James Foster Condy was married in Acton to Polly Ingraham in 1777.
As soon as Boston was evacuated on St. Patrick's Day, 1776, most of these people evidently returned, but we find one family, John and Elizabeth Rogers and their children, still living here as late as 1781.
The next change Acton was subjected to was evidently brought on by the Boston refugees (but one that was hardly their fault). This was the siege of smallpox in the summer of 1775.
Again, the extent of this was not recorded, but its most prominent victim was Rev. John Swift, the first and only minister Acton had thus far had. Already, apparently, in feeble physical, as well as mental, health, he was left completely unable to preach, yet lingered on till November, when he died. The last entry in the church record book in his hand, by then a scarcely legible scrawl, full of errors and false starts, is dated "Oct. 1. 1775" (sic).
During his illness, and after his death, Acton seems to have relied on the intermittent services of any otherwise unoccupied preacher that could be found. On one occasion this was a 16-year-old sophomore from Harvard College, then holding classes in exile in Concord. This was William Bentley, latter the famed minister of Salem, antiquarian, linguist, etc., whose diary is one of the valuable source-books of 18th century New England; and the first religious service of his long and successful career was performed in Acton, at the William Cutting hone, at 88 Prospect Street. As he later wrote in his diary:
“... At (the Cuttings) house I officiated for the first time when a sophomore at College. The minister, Mr. Swift, being sick, I traveled from Concord and officiated in the house of Mr. Cutting. I had just reproof from my tutor, but great success."
It was over a month after Swift's death before an interim preacher Rev. Edward Sprague was found to supply the pulpit through May of 1776. The existing church records, admittedly only fragmentary, indicate he did this only on a part time basis, with worship being held only about once a month.
On 17 May 1776 a committee was instructed to begin, with the advice of the president of Harvard and the neighboring ministers, to find four candidates, each to preach for 4 successive Sundays.
The names of these hopeful young men are not recorded, except for one. In August it was voted to hear candidate Moses Adams for 8 additional Sundays and in December for 4 Sundays. He was chosen in Jan. 1777, and the only other interim minister who appears in the records after that was Josiah Bridge of Sudbury in April.
Adams accepted the call in May, was ordained in June, and continued to serve the Acton church for the next 42 years.
From the official records of the town we gather that the war was uppermost in people's minds, but that their day to day routine had to come first, and that as the struggle wore on, by the frequency with which special meetings were called to discuss only one or two items, they were often at a complete loss as to how to deal with it, in the face of rising prices, wildly f1uctuating currency and demands to send more men.
A revealing indication is the state of town offices chosen annually at the March town meeting during the war years: Moderator, Selectmen, Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety, Constables, Wardens, Surveyors of highways, Town Treasurer, Sealer of Weights and Measures, Tithing Men (to keep order in the Meeting House), Fence Viewers, Surveyor of Clapboards and Shingles (an inspector to ensure the quantity of these items sold out of town), Fish Reeve (inspector), Culler of Hoops and Staves (inspector of barrels made to be sold), Hog Reeves.
Identical to the slate that had been chosen every year since 1735, and (with some of the Inspectors' titles and duties updated) similar to that chosen today.
The only Revolutionary Committee was the Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety, of which more later.
Town meetings were intensely local affairs. To quote Josiah Adams, writing in 1835 on the subject of Acton town meeting just before the war: There seems, in those days, to have been none of that hunger and thirst for political popularity and distinction, which have since become, in most of our towns, so raging and destructive. It is to be supposed, also, that the expenses attendant on the support of public worship, the making and repairing of roads, the maintenance of schools, the support of the poor, and other necessary expenses, the town was not very well able to meet the burdens of a representative in the Legislature. So long as their daily occupations were not interrupted, and they were permitted to manage their farms, and their town meetings, after their own fashion, the inhabitants were willing that others should have the honors and the burdens of legislation. To choose hog reeves at every March meeting - to close the meeting, by enacting (as they always did) that "Swine shall run at large the present year;" and to open the Bay meeting, by a resolve, not to choose a deputy, seem to have been the beginning and the end of their political ambition. (End of quote)
But, after their occupations were interrupted and there were threats that they might not be permitted to manage their own farms, Actonians did begin to enter the larger political world. They began to choose, almost annually, a deputy or Representative to the General Court. That the town considered its long held semi-isolation ended is indicated by a vote in May 1775 to pay L78/10 to Josiah Hayward for his expenses in the Congress and pay for 3 journeys and 20 days attendance at the General Court."
And they elected a Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety. Our Acton historians have often overlooked this Committee, but it was important in its time, its purpose being to keep towns in close communication with advice and information relating to the Revolutionary cause. (We tend to forget how slow such communication was before the age of telegraph, telephone and television.)
Acton had elected its first Committee of Correspondence in 1774; two years after most other towns had complied with Samuel Adams' request that all towns keep in close contact.
During the war, Acton elected this committee annually. It will perhaps be interesting to give, for the first time, a complete list of the people who were elected to it after 1776, people who thus held a large degree of responsibility to their fellow townspeople.
1776 (repeating the Committee chosen 11 Dec. 1775) Lt. John Heald, Ephraim Hosmer, Capt. Simon Hunt (repeating in July, at his request, by Thomas Noyes), Lt. Joseph Brabrook, Capt. Joseph Robbins.
1777. Simon Tuttle, Ammi Faulkner, Jonathan Hosmer, Nathan Parlin, John Hunt, Daniel Davies, Lt. John Heald.
1778. Capt. Joseph. Robbins, Nathaniel Edwards, Lt. Thomas Noyes, Capt. Israel Heald, Oliver Jones, Jonas Brooks, Samuel Wright.
1779. Capt. Robbins, Samuel Wright, Seth Brooks, Lt. Thomas Noyes, Silas Conant.
1780. Capt. Joseph Robbins, Israel Heald, Oliver Jones, Daniel Davies, Seth Brooks.
1781. Ephraim Hosmer, Daniel Shepard, John Hayward, Samuel Fitch, Benjamin Brabrook, Samuel Wright, Joseph Barker.
1782. Lt. Thomas Noyes, Lt. David Forbush, Ephraim Hosmer, Capt. Joseph Robbins, Samuel Piper.
1783. Capt. Joseph Robbins, Capt. Simon Hunt, Mr. Simon Tuttle, Capt. Daniel Davies, Mr. Aaron Jones.
1785. Capt. Joseph Robbins, Capt. Simon Hunt, Ammi Faulkner.
Evidence indicates that one of their duties involved the attempts to regulate prices when the currency began to fluctuate. Their complete doings are not recorded and their only official instructions from the town appear in 1783: "to hear a letter from the Committee of Correspondence of Boston, with resolutions respecting the admission of our implicit enemies the refugees into this Commonwealth.” A puzzling statement.
It has been seen that Acton gladly welcomed the Boston refugees, and the only "foreign" name that appears after this in the town vital records is a family named Newnham, from Philadelphia, much later, in 1786.
The fact that a committee was chosen in 1784, after the war was ended, has also puzzled historians. Adams, in his Historical Address (1835),
Hypothesizes that perhaps there W2 re sane remaining Tories who were thought to deserve further inspection. Yet, the recollections (in the James T. Woodbury Historical Papers) of Charles Tuttle, who grew up during the Revolutionary period, state, quite inequivocably, that there was "not one Tory in Acton."
The instructions prepared by the town on 14 June 1776 for its representative to General Court, Mark White, make it clear that Acton (if, see the text, somewhat belatedly) fully agreed with the idea of complete separation from British rule that had been evolved by the Congress in the preceding months.
The Document reads in part: "Our not being favored with the resolution of the Hon. House of Representatives calling upon the several town in this Colony to express their minds with respect to the important question of American Independence, in the occasion of our not expressing our minds sooner. But we now cheerfully embrace this opportunity to instruct you on that important question…the present age will be deficient in their duty to God, their posterity and themselves if they do not establish an American Republic. This is the only form of government we wish to see established." (The entire text is printed in Phalen I s History, pp. 87-88.)
When, and how, Acton received word of the Declaration of Independence is not recorded. Evidently tile printed copy came in late July or early August, as town clerk, Francis Faulkner, copied it into the town record book, including the instructions at the bottom: "17 July 1776 "Ordered then the Declaration of Independence be printed and a copy sent to the Ministers of each Parish of every denomination within this state and that they severally be required to read the same to their respective congregation as soon as divine service is ended in the afternoon of the first Lord's Day after shall have read it and after such publication thereof to deliver the said Declaration to the Clerks of the several towns or districts who are hereby requested to record the same in their respective town or district books there to remain as a perpetual memorial thereof."
With independence declared, the civil war became a revolution. Soldiers were needed to fight it and the Provinces had to assume the legal characteristics of states. In October Acton unanimously seconded this proposal that Massachusetts should frame a state constitution.
For the first 2 or 3 years of the war Acton, like Concord and other towns around, contributed its quota of soldiers for the cause, and what supplies they would spare, freely and without question.
I t is not possible at this time to give a complete account of the soldiers Acton sent and in what campaigns they acted. But from the next published accounts, some of the main items can be given,
Captain William Smith's Company, mustered 24 Apr. 1775 for 8 months service, included 23 men from Acton. These are the ones who fought at Bunker Hill and their names are given in Phalen, pp. 85-86.
For 2 months service at Cambridge, Acton was ordered to supply 13 men in January 1776.
At the reorganization of the militia in Feb. 1776, Acton was assigned to the 3rd Regiment, of which Francis Faulkner was Lt. Col. The 5th company of this regiment belonged to Acton, with Captain Simon Hunt, 1st Lt. John Heald Jr. and 2nd Lt. Benjamin Brabrook as the officers.
On 20 March according to d. letter addressed to his wife, we find John Heald at Ticonderoga with two other Acton men, Samuel Piper and Daniel Barker, who was killed there.
On June the 26, 1776, the Massachusetts Assembly "made choice by ballot of the following gentlemen as field officers for the third battalion destined to Canada, via: Jona. Reed, Col. Benj. Brown, Lieut. Col. Daniel Fletcher, major. " The latter was an Acton man, and seven days later Acton Town Meeting voted to raise money to pay the men who would enlist in Col. Jonathan Reed's regiment bound for Canada.
Major Daniel Fletcher, who lived in a house (burnt c. 1900) that stood at 119 Parker Street was a veteran of the French and Indian Wars and had been wounded and taken prisoner in Canada in 1758. Perhaps it was his previous experience that prompted the Assembly to enlist his aid in the American attempt to win Canada. Evidently sane litigation arose as to his pay, for in October he requested the town to either pay him the same as an ordinary soldier or to excuse him from further taxation to raise soldiers' pay.
The town voted him down, but he went anyway and died in Canada in December. His epitaph, in Woodlawn Cemetery, reads:
"Tis dangers great he has gone through
From enemies' hands his God him Drew
When fighting for that noble cause,
His country and its famous laws.
But now we trust to rest has gone
Where wars and fightings there is none.”
In the draft ordered 12 Sept. 1776 for service at White Plains, Acton supplied 15 men for one company, of which Simon Hunt was Captain and Ebenezer White, 2nd Lt. Acton's candidate for Minister, Moses Adams, was the Chaplain. The names of only 4 others from Acton, who fought in this battle (which the Americans lost) are preserved: Col. Francis Faulkner, Aaron Jones, Stephen Shepard and Thomas Darby, who was killed there. Lt. White, who kept the 1st tavern on the site of Nagog Hotel, must have suffered from exposure there, for he died about a month after their return.
Acton sent 13 men for the New York campaign in Nov. 1776. In 1777, we' find the record, on a gravestone in Woodlawn Cemetery, that Jonathan Hosmer (nephew of Abner Hosmer who was lettered at Concord fight) "died in the service of his Country in Bennington."
For the taking of Burgoyne at Saratoga in October 1777, Acton and Concord raised a volunteer company of 63 men. Two of the officers were Acton men, Lt. John Heald and Sergeant Samuel Piper. Others from Acton included: Col Francis Faulkner, Capt. Simon Hunt, Joseph Brown (who at Saratoga shot back the bullet he had been wounded with at Bunker Hill). Also, Daniel Davis, Reuben Davis, Aaron Jones, Stephen Shepard, Solomon Smith, Edward Wetherbee.
Burgoyne's defeated army was marched to' Massachusetts as prisoners of war. Seemingly some of them were routed thraugh Actan, far in Charles Tuttle's recollection, in the Woodbury Historical Papers, is the note that "a large number of horses, wagons etc., after the taking of Burgoyne, came down by his father's, and stopped there to' rest one Sabbath day; and men etc. cane down the Great Road bound for Boston" The Tuttle house was at the top of Nagog Hill, an the site now owned by the Young's.
Acton's Capt. Simon Hunt commanded one of the companies that guarded the prisoners at Cambridge.
Burgoyne's surrender marked the end of the war in the north, and after the scene of action moved south, the effort seemed to' have little direct bearing on New England.
Acton, from what the public records show, was growing weary of the war and the strain it was causing.
At great effort, the town managed to fill its quota of men far the Rhode Island campaign and the Continental Army. How many of the men that filled the quota were Actonians, and how many were substitutes that they hired, is not known.
A few of the Actonians who did enlist were Thos Thorp, Ephraim Billing, Solomon Smith, and Benjamin Hayward. Simon Tuttle hired a substitute, a blackman, Titus Hayward.
Samuel Hosmer was in the tedious campaign to guard Rhode Island and there "subsisted on horse flesh and berries."
Thomas Thorp is the only Actonian known to have been at Valley Forge, and his recollections of that time (in the Woodbury Historical Papers) show that to relieve boredom of that grim time, he made a linen bag, tied with strings to keep his orderly sergeant papers in. (He later gave the bag to Mr. Woodbury, but, it evidently was not returned to the town by his heirs when they gave the rest of his Acton Revolutionary relics to the Library.)
A few people, according to the town records, flatly refused to serve in the army any more, paying fines instead. One of those who refused to serve in Rhode Island am paid a fine in 1778 was Aaron Jones. He evidently wished to settle down, to marry Abigail Billing, and became the humble innkeeper and miller that he was long remembered as clearly no disgrace was attached to his actions, for as has been seen, he was later elected to serve on the Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety.
At the same time the problem of filling the military quota became acute another problem struck. The value of currency began to plunge am inflation became colossal.
A table from "Shattuck's History of Concord" will illustrate: in 1777 $100 in silver was worth $105 in currency in 1778 $100 in silver was worth $328 in currency in 1779 $100 in silver was worth $ 742 in currency in 1781 $100 in silver was worth $7500 in currency
Members of the Committee of Correspondence and others attended state and local conventions at Concord in 1779 to endeavor to establish price-currents (a basic price) on articles necessary for subsistence and to form measures to prevent monopoly and extortion. But the rate of inflation was so rapid that most of the adjourned sessions were spent.
Throughout 1779 Acton consistently and conscientiously resolved to follow the Concord example, am to put into execution the law against monopoly and forestalling. Eventually it was recognized as fruitless to regulate something that changed so rapidly.
This was certainly the grimmest period of the war. Acton put off supporting the families of soldiers away on duty until legislation required the families to be paid. It became increasingly difficult to send supplies required for the army (by 1780 the town found itself having to vote, for instance, to give $350 a piece for 10 blankets
